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VESALIUS, 



Reformer and Martyr of Science, 



A HISTORICAL SKETCH 



BY 



PROF. CHARLES BORN. 

ii 



CINCINNATI, OHIO. 
1907. 









r3RARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 
JAN 3 1908 

! ^Copyrisiu tntry 

<B%cxo iq*>~7 

CLASS fir , XXc. N6. 
/?<* 6 GO 
' COPY B. 



ENTERED ACCORDING TO ACT OF CONGRESS 
IN THE YEAR 1907 BY PROF. CHARLES 
BORN IN THE OFFICE OF THE LIBRARIAN 
OF CONGRESS AT WASHINGTON. 



INTRODUCTION. 

In the following sketch some of the principal de- 
tails of the life of the great anatomical investigator, 
Andreas Vesalius, have been gone into to show what 
a bitter struggle for existence scientific research in 
the early stages of its history waged with superstit- 
ion and fanaticism. 

Great comfort is derived from comparing the time 
when Vesalius lived with the present time, and from 
a realization of the great changes that have taken 
place. The flickering light of investigation, then 
weak and unsteady, is transformed into a powerful 
force for the general enlightenment. And while 
Vesalius, a pioneer of scientific research, was com- 
pelled to conduct his investigations underground, 
now science and its discoveries are taught in mag- 
nificent temples of learning. But there still is a 
struggle between the disciples of enlightenment and 
its enemies, with the roles reversed ; now study is 
pursued in the full light of day, while the apostles 
of superstition and fanaticism are working more or 
less underground and in the dark. 

Vesalius, the investigator and martyr, is one of 
the heroes who suffered persecution and untold 
hardships for what we now possess, and he calls 
forth our highest admiration and our most grateful 

respect. 

If this biographical sketch of Vesalius, the reform- 
er and martyr of science, awakens a desire and ef- 
fort for the further enlightenment of the human 
mind and strengthens all those who are aiming at 
intellectual freedom the author will feel amply 
repaid for his work. 



The Author. 



Cincinnati, Ohio. 
Junel, 1907. 



i 



VESALIUS. 



ACT T. 

SCENE I. The Tribunal of the Inquisition. 

Inquisitor. (Dark red dahlia as button-hole. 
He turns toward the torturers.) 
Bring the defendants in ! {Defendants in shackles 
are brought in.) 

Inquisitor. { Turning to one of the defendants.) 
You are an apostate of our holy church, a follower 
of the new gospel ; you are a heretic and you have 
confessed your guilt. 

First Defendant. Well, I have pleaded guilty 
under the tortures of the rack, to end my suffering. 
I am not guilty of anything. 

Inquisitor. {Severely.) And now you deny your 
guilt? 

Defend. Upon my solemn oath, T am innocent; 
the Duchess Margareth, the Governor of the Nether- 
lands, has granted us protestants, in a special trea- 
tise, permission to think otherwise ps regards the 
holy communion than the church in power. I am a 
predicant, and insist upon my right granted by 
special treatise. 

Inquis. You kuow, or at all events you should 
know, that the Duchess Margareth afterwards, at 



repeated times, publicly declared that she does not 
consider herself bound by the treatise ; as the united 
heretics, to wit, the Anabaptists, Calvinists and 
Lutherans, took advantage of the embarassment of 
the Governor of the Netherlands and forced the trea- 
tise in question upon the Duchess Margareth. You 
have been permitted to think otherwise of the holy 
communion, but to perform it in another than the 
usual manner means crime. In addition, you ought 
to know that the way you baptize and marry, and 
your manner of burial, are forbidden by the law, on 
the penalty of death. You know that a trifling 
change in the ceremonies at church, which the back- 
sliders are found guilty of, is considered to be a 
felony, and that a number of predicants, who ad- 
ministered their duties at a place other than the one 
they had been ordered to occupy, have been pro- 
ceeded against and hanged. Do you plead guilty 
now? 

Defend. I do not. I insist upon my privilege ac- 
cording to treatise. 

Inguis. (Turning toward rackers.) Lay hold of 
him and take him down once more on the stretch ! 

Defend. Mercy ! I have a wife and children. 

Inquis. That is another felony; you say you are 
married, a man who pretends to preach the gospel! 

Defend. Do you try a second time to compel me 
under the tortures of the rack to accuse myself of a 
crime which I never committed? You know as well 
as I that you will never succeed in torturing the 
truth out of the scorched flesh and the quivering 
nerves by the aid of a pair of red-hot tongs, or by 
use of the thumbscrews. 



Inquis. (Turning to lorlurers.) Seize him and 
take him down once more into the chamber of hor- 
ror ; put him on the rack. 

The lorlurers seize him, and lake him down- 
stairs, underground. 

Inquis. (Addressing the other defendant.) You 
are accused of robbery, and have been found guilty 
according to the evidence given by eye-witnesses. 
Do you plead guilty? 

Second Defendant. I do. 

Inquis. You have always been a faithful and de- 
voted Christian, have you not? 

Defend. I have always been a devout churchgoer, 
and can present all the tickets of my regular con- 
fessions ; there is not one missing. The devil came 
along quite suddenly and led me into temptation. 
He was so quick that I did not even find time to be- 
cross myself and say a prayer. 

Inquis. Do you repent your crime? 

Defend. [Becrossing himself '.] Indeed I do, with 
all my heart, as true as God is in being! 

Inquis. You have been sentenced to be broken 
on the wheel up to the neck, but we will change this 
sentence on the condition that you bring to justice, 
dead or alive, one or the other of the miscreants 
who steal the corpses from fhe wheel and the gal- 
lows, and even from the grave. 

d heartrending cry is heard from the base- 
ment. 

Inquis. [Pointing toward basement.] That 
apostate and backslider of our holy church will now 
soon change his mind, down in the chamber of tor- 
ture ! 



The dead man as well as the live one belongs 
to the church, and he who steals a corpse from the 
gallows robs the church, and consequently the Lord, 
thus committing a mortal sin that can only be re- 
quited by capital punishment. The question is to 
find the hiding places where those miscreants take 
the bodies as the idols of science ; in fact, for their 
black and devilish artifices. For that purpose you 
must suffer being stolen from the wheel. Those 
wicked men, in their contempt of God and the Holy 
Church, are associated with the devil, and we give 
you full authority to capture them dead or alive; 
or, at all events, to ferret out their hiding places, 
and accomplishing this you will be dismissed with- 
out punishment. 

(Defendant is led away. 

Tnquis. Now, dear members of this Tribunal of 
the Holy Inquisition, you fellow combatants in the 
battle for the cause of God and the Holy Church, 
let us send up a quiet prayer for the aid of the Al- 
mighty. Wheresoever a foe of the Holy Church is 
disclosed, he is to be annihilated. At the present 
time of wickedness Satan is amongst us, represent- 
ed by the Anabaptists, the Calvinists and the Lu- 
therans. Luther, the apostate, is the principal in- 
strument of the devil, and what they call science is 
the greatest of hellish artifices, for its aim is to rob 
the faithful of their belief in God and estrange them 
from the Church. It is science that kills untold 
numbers of souls and delivery them to the arch- 
fiend of God — to the devil — and to the tortures of 
eternal perdition. It is the solemn duty of every 
believer in the Holy Church to save those poor and 



misled souls from everlasting perdition. Therefore, 
let us use all our public power, and all our most se- 
cret influence, to fight Satan, the prince of darkness, 
by crushing science, one of his principal tools. In- 
vestigation is sin, because it aims at lifting the veil 
from things God in his infinite wisdom has resolved 
shall remain secreted forever. He has revealed 
what is to our benefit ; it is belief and not science 
that comforts and benefits mankind. For the sake 
of belief, God in heaven has sacrificed his only son, 
but not for the sake of a science that undermines 
belief in God. All of you know that among us, in 
this very city, we have agents of Satan, who ran- 
sack gallows and graves, using the bodies for their 
wicked purposes, and all for the sake of under- 
mining the foundation of the Holy Church. Science 
and scientific research are inventions of the devil, 
and are his most efficient instruments. Call to 
mind Mondini, dissecting human bodies, and Huss 
and Savanarola, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Ulrich 
de Huiien, and others, and tell me what they de- 
serve. [The Tribunal gives the unanimous answer : 
"They deserve death."] Now swear that you will do 
all in your power to annihilate the agents and in- 
struments of Satan. Let us touch the wounds of 
our Saviour and swear: Fial jus'tilia, pereal mun- 
di! Let justice be done though the whole world 
perishes. [The board answers unanimously: "We 
swear."] 

Inquis. Now let us pray for the aid of the Al- 
mighty, in order that he may assist in our glorious 
Christian work. 

sill pray silently. 



Well, now we are prepared for our work, and all 
for the glory of God ! 

[ Turning lo lorlurers.~\ Bring in the defendant. 
They bring him in, assisting him lo keep upon 

his feel. 

Inquis. Now you have changed your mind, have 
you not? Do you plead guilty? 

(Defend. I am not guilty. I am a predicant of the 
New Creed, and I insist upon my right according to 
the treatise, to be allowed to preach the new gospel. 

Inquis. You are a predicant of the new creed, to 
wit, of heresy, and that is a capital sin ; and the 
fact that you do not plead guilty to your heresy and 
renounce it is another capital sin, and that you do 
not repent is an additional sin. Moreover, you once 
preached at a place other than the one at which you 
had permission, and that means an additional fel- 
ony ; you ought to be glad that you are in position 
to lose but one life though deserving manifold death. 
[Turning to the Tribunal.] What is your sentence, 
gentlemen? Is the defeadant guilty? 

The Tribunal answers unanimously: "The de- 
fendant is guilty, deserving of death." 

Inquis. We find you guilty and sentence you to 
death. Prepare yourself for your last hour ; tomor- 
row you go to the gallows ! God be merciful to 
your poor soul. {Turning lo lorlurers.) Take him 
away! 

lis Ihey la Ice hold of Mm and lead him away, 
he lurns about and shouts: 

You are no judges; you are agents of that Devil 
about whom you prate ! 



SCENE II. Anne and Ballhasar. 

Ballhasar. Well, Anne? 

Anne* Well, Balthasar. 

Ballh. You are going to be my wife? Now I am 
the happiest creature on earth. 

Anne. Who said that I am going to be your wife? 

Ballh. Anne, you said "Well, Balthasar," when 
I asked "Well, Anne?" 

Anne. I did not understand the meaning of your 
"Well. Anne?" 

BallTi. I keep on thinking of you all the time ; 
have not you any idea of all my suffering? 

Anne. I see that you squirm and keep holding 
your hands to the stomach. Do you suffer from 
stomach-ache? 

(Ba'llh. I feel so unhappy. Say, what shall I do? 

Anne. Take some hot tea. 

tBallh. How's that ! You mean to cure my love- 
sick heart with hot tea? How my heart does nutter ! 

Anne. Small wooder, your heart is too timid! 
Why don't you get a lion's heart? 

BaWi. But where can I get one? 

Anne. Get courage. 

Ballh. Where from? I have courage enough to 
marry you. 

Anne- I shall get married to a man who has the 
heart of a lion. 

Ballh. I feel now almost like a lion ! 

Anne. Why do you not assist my brother, who 
tonight will have a duty to perform that requires 
the courage of the lion. 

Ballh. Most certainly I will do it. I promise. 
And then I may hope? 



Anne. Only then. Tonight, in assisting my 
brother, you will have an opportunity to prove that 
you have a stout heart. 

Ballh. (To himself.) What will that be? 
{Aloud.) Whatever it may be I'll go through the 
fire for your sake, my dear Anne. 

Anne. I am not yet your Anne. "You will go 
through the fire for my sake ! " Why not through 
the dark night, too? 

Ballh. Of course ! ( Timidly.) With or without 
a lantern? Through the fire one can make his way 
without a ] an tern, but not through the dark. 

Anne. Would you dare to look death in the face? 

Ballh. Not by night, because then I cannot see; 
armed with a lantern I will look in both his eyes. 

Anne. You will have to face death. 

Ballh. My own death, or the death of somebody 
else? 

Anne. Your own. 

Ballh. Well, to meet death does not require a 
lantern ; one can die as well in the dark as by day- 
light. But what in the world is to become of my 
marriage? 

Anne. Marriages are made in heaven. 

Ballh. Anne, I have struck an idea! Give me 
a kiss; that will give me the courage of a lion. 

Anne. Not now. A kiss shall be the reward of 
your having accomplished something. Show your 
courage and go at midnight — 

Ballh. (Interrupting her.) "At midnight! " I 
can show my courage by daylight as well; it is 
worth being looked at by daylight ; it need not be 
hidden. 



Anne- At midnight. 

Batik. With or without moonshine? 

Anne. At midnight, without moonlight, you will 
have to go to the graveyard, and — 

Balih. {With fear, to himself: Anne is pre- 
paring a nice mess for me. "To go to the grave- 
yard! " Is that not sufficient? What, then, is that 
"and" for?) 

Anne. And to handle a corpse. 

Balih. With or without mitts? 

Anne. With your bare hands. You know that 
my brother, Ansel m, is my guardian, and he has 
made this a point in his consent to my marriage. 
He says that you have a wonderful heart of — 

Balih. (Interrupting her.) Heart of a lion. 
You see your brother knows my heart better than 
you. 

Anne. Why don't you let me finish? He says 
you have a wonderful heart of a hare. 

Balih. I have the heart of a hare ! Goodbye, 
Anne ! Now I will go straight to your brother, and 
find out what cruel game he is going to play upon 
me. [He goes.] 

Anne. How I would like to save dear, timid 
Balthasar that hard ordeal ! But brother Anselm 
cannot perform his difficult and dismal task alone. 
He needs a faithful and discreet helpmate. Brother 
Anselm is always willing and ready to put his life 
at stake if his fearless and high-minded friend, 
Master Vesalius, is to be rendered a service. I will 
now go and tell my brother that tonight he will 
have an honest and devoted helper. 



SCENE III. Graveyard by night 
zlnselm and Ballhasar. 

Ans. Here we are at our place of destination. 

Ballh. I am more dead than alive. 

Sins. Already ! Indeed ! Well, a burying ground 
is more fit for the dead than the alive. All those 
people down there, under ground, are also more 
dead than alive, and if you do not look out, you 
will tomorrow be dangling at the gallows — still 
more dead than alive. It is always preferable to 
die this way, [making a pass with his forefinger in 
a horizontal direction,] that is in bed, than to die 
this way, [making a move in a vertical direction,] 
that is at the gallows. 

Ballh. I am afraid of being here at midnight ! 

pins. I am afraid, too. I am afraid of your being 
afraid. 

Ballh. There, the chimes of the chapel tower 
strike midnight. What a dismal hour ! 

Ans. What is there dismal about midnight! 
The clock strikes twelve, precisely as at noon. 

Ballh. And what a death-like stillness ! 

$Lns. The dead, as a rule, are very still. All 
those people there, underground, who when alive 
had so much to say are now dumb and still. 

Ballh. The night is raven-black! 

Sins. Indeed, as raven-black as the ravens that 
croak yonder at the gallows ! [The croaking of 
ravens is heard.] 

Ballh. I don't hear them. It is even too dark to 
hear! The darkness around prevents my seeing 
how dark it is. Sight and hearing leave me. 



Ans. The ravens are greeting us because they 
scent in us two gallow birds ; or, maybe, they are 
angry because we come to snatch two dainty mor- 
sels from them! 

Ballh. Night is nobody's friend! 

tins. On the contrary, it is our best friend; 
night is friendly to thieves. 

Ballh. Oh ! we are thieves ! 

Vlns. Not yet ; but we have the best intention. 
But no; we do not steal, the thief steals, taking 
what belongs to other people and using it for his 
own benefit. Where there is no property there can 
be no thieves. Those fellows dangling from the 
gallows are nobody's property, and we are about to 
take them down, not to enrich ourselves, but for the 
purpose of scientific investigation. 

'Ballh. For what we are about to perpetrate there 
is no dispense. 

Sins. Who says so? I'll give you any amount — 
as much as you want of it. 

Ballh. You are a wicked man ; you are infected 
by the Luther plague. (He becrosses himself.) 
It is late, one o'clock draws near. 

$Ln$. One o'clock! That is early. It cannot 
well strike less than one o'clock. Now, Balthasar, 
we must look out, otherwise we may fare badly. 
Don't forget that I have a sister whose name is 
Anne. She will never yield her heart to a hare- 
hearted man. 

Ballh. Oh, my dear Anne! Anselm! Now I 
feel almost like a lion. 

Ans. JLlmosl like a lion ! (The cry of a screech 
owl is heard.) 



Ballh. {Timidly.) Ha,rk! (To himself .) What 
a dismal sound! 

pins. What are you mumbling? 

c Ballh. How loveJy it sounds! About as sweet 
as the croaking of the raven beneath the gallows. 
It is not a good foreboding. 

pins. Indeed, look out, or it may prove for you a 
dismal foreboding, if tomorrow you swing at the 
gallows. By that call of a screech owl a friend gives 
me warning that the way is not yet clear. The 
grave-wardens are on their midnight beat, and they 
are drawing nearer. 

Ballh. Oh, oh, now I am lost! 

pins. ( Under his breath.) If you don't show 
that you possess the heart of a lion, I will call the 
wardens ; then goodbye, Anne. 

Ballh. I will do everything you tell me. 

Pins. I am just going to bury you. 

Ballh. Why you are not going to bury me alive, 
are you? 

pins. Fear has made you more dead than alive. 

Ballh. Then I shall be buried without having 
confessed ! 

pins. You can attend to your confession under- 
ground ; but before you can do that we must perpe- 
trate something to have something to confess. I 
promise you an early resurrection. (Anselm lifts 
one end of a tombstone slab ) Now make haste and 
get down, I shall follow you immediately ! 

Ballh. For heaven's sake ! Down there I shall 
go-! It looks like the gates of hell ! 

Pins. There, I see the torches of the patro] ! Get 
in and down or tomorrow you will swing at the gal- 



lows. {Ballhasar slides down the opening and dis- 
appears, vlnselm follows; then tombstone, that 
serves as a lid of the grave, closes like a trap door. 
Grave wardens with torches turn up in the back- 
ground, and draw near.) 

One of the Grave Wardens, I am sure I have 
heard voices in this direction. 

The Corporal. I think you are mistaken. 

Warden. By all the saints, I am not mistaken ! 

Corporal. Does it not seem to you as if that 
tombstone were waving in the air like a long, white 
veil? 

{till horrified.) Sure! It is a ghost! (;# voice 
from under the ground: "Do give me peace!" Gen- 
eral excitement among the grave wardens.) 

One of the Wardens. This voice came out of the 
grave. (M the grave wardens becross themselves.) 

Corporal. Well, we are not here to hunt for the 
dead, but for the living. Draw closer and let us 
offer a quiet prayer for the poor soul that cannot 
find rest. There are, indeed, signs and miracles in 
these godless and unfaithful times, when Luther and 
others have rebelled against the Holy Church, their 
mother. {Grave wardens in quiet prayer. They 
then withdraw, flfier a while the tomb slab rises 
again, but slowly, and the head of flnselm is visible, 
cautiously looking round. Finally vlnselm emerges 
from under the lifted slab.) 

tins. Well, Balthasar, you hare-hearted creature, 
get out if you are still alive. Oh, my poor sister ! 

( Balih. {While climbing out of the grave.) Oh, 
Anne, now I am a man ! ( Under his breath and 
timidly.) Are they gone? It was fearful down 



there. Oh, Anne, I can achieve everything for your 
sake! 

Pins. Well, come along to the gallows, and if you 
don't do what I order you to do you will have to go 
tomorrow upon the gallows, and that will break your 
neck, and the neck of your marriage, too. Now go 
and take the corpse from the gallows, while I take 
the other one that is fastened to the rack. See if the 
corpse is quite stiff and cold, as sometimes they are 
still about half alive. Do not forget to leave a piece 
of the rope attached to the corpse when you cut him 
down. Having done this we will put each body into 
a sack, lift it over the low graveyard wall, and 
then drag both bundles to this spot and dump them 
down into the grave vault. 

Ballh. I hear something like the croaking of 
ravens. That is ominous! 

pins. Oh ! I see now you have suddenly recovered 
your hearing, but I tell you stop immediately your 
croaking or it may come to pass that tomorrow the 
ravens will pick your eyes from their sockets. ( The 
croaking of ravens is heard-.) Indeed, here they 
are ! They are glad to make your acquaintance. 
Well, now, let us set to work. {'Both climb over the 
low wall of the church yard. Then a thud is heard, 
and, after a brief interval, another dull sound. 
They climb back over the wall of the graveyard 
and drag the bundles forward.) 

Sins. Now we have got them ; one life and a half 
we have put at the stake and we have got two stiffs. 

Ballh. How do you mean? 

pins. I have put one life, my life, at the stake, 
and you, Balthasar, only half a life, because you are 



half way dead. (JLnselm lifts one end of the slab, 
securing il by an iron rod, then ITiey dump the 
bundles into the opening and follow them, ttnselm 
is late lo follow, and al the moment he reaches out 
his arms lo adjust the slab the cry of a load is 
heard.) 

jlns> That cry of a toad means that the catchers 
are near, but they won't catch anything. (He allows 
the slab lo gently slide down into Us framing. 
Grave wardens appear in the background and draw 
near.) 

The Corporal. We must do everything in our 
power to catch those rascals; the gallows as well as 
the rack have been plundered and both corpses have 
disappeared. A trace leads from the gallows to and 
over the wall of the graveyard to this spot. It is 
not ghosts that robbed the gallows, but crooked men. 
(Turning to one of the grave wardens.) Show me 
a light! Look here, the dew has been wiped from 
the grass, and these grounds, consecrated with holy 
water, have been desecrated. I put my head at 
stake ; I will hunt down the miscreants. They shall 
not escape the capital punishment meted out for this 
offence. They cannot have secreted their heavy 
burdens as yet, and are most certainly still within 
the limits of the graveyard. (Turning to the grave 
wardens.) Go and make a thorough search. 

[Grave wardens disband, going different directions 
to make a thorough investigation. The cry of a 
screech owl is heard from beneath the ground, the 
leader of the patrol answers by the same cry, and 
stooping down taps three times on the slab saying: 
"Now you are safe, hail to science!"] 



SCENE IV. 

Van Sylvius and his daughter, Sylvia, Ihe former 
having a dark dahlia as a bullon-hole. 

Sylvius. I sent for you to learn if I may still call 
you my daughter. 

Sylvia. Dear father ! 

Sylv. Up till now you have been my pride and 
my delight. 

Sylvia. And now, father, I am not longer your 
pride and your delight? 

Sylv. You have done the utmost to estrange your 
father. If your heart allows you to sacrifice your 
father and your faith, your honor ought to forbid 
you to drag the glorious traditions of our family into 
the mire. 

Sylvia. What harsh and strange words! I do 
not know what to think of you, dear father. I do 
not understand what you mean. 

Sylv. And I do not understand what you do. I, 
myself, do not know what to think of you. What 
has come over you? Are you still a devoted believer? 
Are you still a faithful confessor of our holy church? 
Or have the heretics lured you into their satanic 
snares and made you forget your father and all the 
time-honored and glorious traditions of our patrician 
family? We have cherished and guarded that 
family treasure like our eyeballs. Up to this very 
day I have been hoping and trusting you might again 
find yourself. But alas ! You are more than ever 
under the influence of a heretic. Your new creed — 
is — Vesalius — 

Sylvia. 0, my dear father, do not utter such cruel 
and merciless words! It is not only a desire of my 



heart, but the duty of my conscience, to raise my 
voice against any misrepresentation of a man whose 
genius and irreproachable character deserve the 
highest praise. 

Sylv. Well, all you say only confirms my belief 
that the necromancer, Vesalius, who practices his 
hellish, black artifice undergound, has entirely 
ensnared you in his satanic meshes. I now realize 
that the time has passed for acting as your father, 
and therefore I will take measures as your guardian. 
In any event, I do not want to be the father of a 
daughter who sacrifices the eternal welfare of her 
soul in order to exchange it for the friendship of a 
heretic. Solemnly and upon my oath I declare right 
here, that at this very instant I cease to be your 
father, and the first thing I intend to do as your 
guardian is to endeavor to save your poor soul from 
eternal perdition by having you transferred to a 
convent. 

Sylvia. For heaven's sake, don't do that, my 
father I I prefer to die rather than be buried alive 
in a convent. 

Sylv. Indeed, it is for heaven's sake that I am 
going to have you taken to a convent, because it is 
high time for you to look out for your salvation and 
offer up daily and even hourly prayers in order to 
save your soul from eternal perdition. 

Sylvia. Do you really think you are able to force 
me back into the dungeon of your belief? Never, 
never! Not blind belief, but truth and science is 
now my heaven. It is enlightenment that my soul 
is longing for, after having been kept languishing in 
the dark of mental incarceration. 



Sylv. More enlightenment! Well, you and your 
wicked company shall have it, for it may be that by 
tomorrow the flames of the stake will blaze fiercely, 
at which Vesalius, the hero of your faith, will be 
transfigured and glorified. 

Sylvia. Please cease using such horrible language, 
such cruel words of the wildest fanaticism, convinc- 
ing me that — I — no — longer — have — a — father ! 

No father can lacerate the heart of his daughter in 
such cruel manner. (Pressing her hands to her 
heart.) Keep up your courage, thou poor, tortured, 
quivering heart! Thou art full to bursting with 
agony, but thou hast the sublime mission to beat for 
him in whom all my life and all my happiness is 
rooted. Every time thou beatest, thou beatest for 
him, the hero and herald of the gospel of freedom of 
conscience and thought ! He who believes that truth 
can be cremated at the blazing stake, and thus be- 
come wiped from the face of the earth, need not be 
surprised if he encounter sad disappointment. For, 
out of the ashes of the martyr of the new gospel rises 
with unfettered wings the Phoenix of truth, soaring 
to more luminous spheres, up toward the sun, encom- 
passing triumphantly the universe. It is you, my 
father, who is in error, and who commits a sin 
against the holy ghost of humanity ; but, verily, I 
say unto you, that neither the fulmination of the 
pope, nor the Duke de Alva, with his Spanish In- 
quisition and his blazing stakes, will succeed in ex- 
tinguishing the eternal light of truth, because that 
light is inextinguishable. And I, for myself, with 
might and main, and as long as a single fiber of my 
heart quivers and as long as a free thought flashes 



through my brain, I will set myself against being 
buried alive in a convent. I do not fear death, but 
I will not sutler being entombed alive. I am sorry, 
my father v that you are right — Veealius and many 
other pioneers of the freedom of thought and scien- 
tific research are compelled to make their anatomical 
researches underground, amidst owls and bats, and 
other creatures of the same feather, shunning the 
light. It is true the flickering light of free thought 
and free investigation is still weak and unsteady, 
but, though small, it is inextinguishable. It is the 
eternal beacon light of science that shines and 
enlightens, while your so-called eternal lamp yields 
but sufficient light to more shockiDgly show the 
awful darkness of the surroundings inimical to 
truthful investigation. And interested hands are 
busy in keeping the human mind enshrouded in that 
everlasting darkness humanity is groping in. At 
present the faint but holy light of the new gospel 
comforts but the investigators of scientific truth, 
who are compelled to maintain a miserable existence 
underground— in cellars and sepulchres. But the 
time will come when the light of science, faint as it 
is at present, will turn into a heavenly light, as 
powerful as the sun himself, to enlighten the minds 
of all human beings that have been darkened under 
the influence of your bigoted belief. It is my belief 
and my gospel that the time will come when this 
light of newly revealed truths, faint and flickering 
as it now is, will become an almighty sun of en- 
lightenment. I know that the time will come when 
scientific investigation will no longer be compelled 
to work and study in dark recesses, but will be pro- 



tec ted and taught in magnificent temples. 

Have they not discovered a New World in the far 
west? It is true, at the present time, Spain uses a 
vast amount of gold, the output of the inexhaustible 
mines of Peru, to destroy the free institutions and 
the sweet liberty of our country, to maintain an 
espionage over all Europe, to force the Spanish In- 
quisition upon the Netherlands, and to keep the 
minds of the people in the dark, and in the bondage 
of the Church, but the time will come, when, in that 
New World, splendid temples will be erected in the 
honor of science, and when the unlimited amount of 
gold, used at the present time to stupefy and enslave 
the human mind, will be employed to enlighten and 
bless mankind and to utterly rend the shackles 
forged upon human thought and scientific investiga- 
tion in the darkness of by-gone centuries. 

Sylv. Well, you see that I am not so intolerant 
and fanatical as you think, otherwise I would not 
have listened for such a long time to your wicked 
utterances, but now I am thoroughly convinced that 
the new and heretical teachings have poisoned your 
body and your soul. Now it is my plain and un- 
mistakable duty to have you taken to a convent ; and 
this, not only for the safety of your soul, but also for 
your bodily welfare, as it might happen that you too 
might be sentenced to death at the stake. And, 
which God forbid, that awful duty to sentence you 
to death might fall to my lot. (Pointing lo Ms 
bullon-liole.) Therefore, get ready for your de- 
parture, which I have arranged for tonight. My 
brother, Professor Sylvius, will see that you are well 
prepared for your future duty, and he will introduce 



you to a convent of Carmelite nuns. (He departs, 
& pause.) 

Sylvia. (Wrapped in thought) What a weight 
of agony lacerates my poor heart! I — have — no — 
longer — a — father — and I am about to lose all that is 
dear to me on this earthly world — to — lose — thee, — 
Vesalius ! What a precipitous fall from my heaven 
to the awful depths of unbounded despair — from the 
sunny and lofty height of sweet dreams of love 
rudely dashed to the yawning tomb of a convent ! 
To be buried alive in a nunnery! Is my ardent 
longing for truth a crime? Are all those sweet and 
heavenly feelings coursing through my heart's quick, 
sinful? But as long as Vesalius is in danger I will 
not stop to think of myself for a single moment. I 
must see and warn him, and (tears well lo her eyes 
and choice her voice) say him good-bye — forever ! 

Shall I tell him what is hanging over him? Shall 
I cast all that load of heart-rending grief upon his 
soul and throw new obstacles across his path, instead 
of assisting him to overcome those obstacles? 

At any rate, I must warn him ! 



SCENE V. 
The grave vault. Vesalius working on a corpse. 
Vesalius. Here I am in the vault of a grave, 
underground, among mould and decomposition, and 
shut off from the life-sustaining elements, fresh air 
and sunshine. Being in search of scientific truth I 
am ostracized and despised by all and have to bear 
the deadly hatred of the Church as well as of the 
credulous crowd. And why? Because I love truth! 
Snares on every hand! I may at any moment expect 
to be annihilated by the fulmination of the pope. 
To such an abominable existence anatomical re- 
search has been reduced, and it is bound to languish 
under the most disgraceful conditions. Where are 
those sunny days science enjoyed among the ancient 
Greeks? Alas ! even then the investigation of truth 
was bitterly hated and persecuted. They condemned 
thee, thou wonderful genius, Socrates, to empty the 
cup filled with the draught of deadly hemlock, for 
being the greatest investigator and heralder of truth. 
Why is truth hated and persecuted! There is a 
certain class of people who derive their subsistence 
and power from unsound doctrines calculated to 
mislead, intimidate and fleece the people, and you, 
Democritus, your fellow citizens shunned you like a 
leper and treated you like a maniac by refusing to 
allow you to dwell among them ; and this because 
you had dissected some animals for scientific pur- 
poses. [Looking up to the crucifix on the wall of 
the grave vault.] And thou, great propounder of the 
truth from Nazareth, they have crucified you 
because you exposed the unsound doctrines of the 
Jewish priestcraft. For that reason they made you, 



the greatest martyr of truth, the victim of their 
deadly hatred. Well, what is it that makes truth 
hated so much by the priestcraft and fills them with 
everlasting hatred against further research? That 
is the great problem! The ideal vocation of the 
priest is to edify the human mind and to improve 
the morals of his flock, yet at all times priestcraft 
has been assiduously endeavoring to obtain full 
sway over the human mind. 

And if you, the sage of Nazareth, should at the 
present time dare preach the same truth they would 
crucify you once more. What have they made out 
of your gospel? They have vilified and misrepre- 
sented and twisted the genuine gospel you preached. 
They have adulterated it. They have made a rope 
out of it to strangle the truth. They can not ac- 
complish this without deceit ; and as scientific inves- 
tigation exposes any and every kind of hocus pocus^ 
they assail it with venomous hate. For that reason 
priestcraft and popery must keep the human mind 
in the dark, as knowledge is a power that sets the 
human mind free. It is the great battle between the 
light and the dark. Who will finally win that 
battle, mankind or priestcraft, enlightenment or 
papacy? Oh, if I could only live one day in time to 
come, when scientific research of any kind will be 
permitted in full daylight and above ground, while 
at present it is compelled to eke out a paltry and 
disgraceful existence in sepulchre vaults and other 
underground recesses ! But as it is, it is my fate to 
live at a time when that gigantic monster, that 
powerful black snake, struggles for his life with 
scientific investigation. Who will finally gain the 



victory? With flaming letters it is imprinted upon 
my mind that there will come a time when scientific 
research will be permitted to stand erect, and inves- 
tigation of truth will not be endangered by the dun- 
geon or the stake, neither by the torturing rack or 
the fulmination of the pope. What is it that makes 
truth so desirable and that makes us love it so 
ardently and devotedly for its own sake? Who is 
able to fathom the overwhelming bliss and magic 
with which truth thrills the mind of the investi- 
gator? For its own sake all the prisoners have suf- 
fered untold mental and bodily agony and that 
agony has still to be suffered and will have to be 
suffered until universal Irulh shall triumph for all 
limes lo come- In spite of the flaring stakes, in 
spite of the torturing racks, in spite of the ban and 
fulmination of the pope, in spite of being persecuted 
and hunted from land to land Tflrich de Hullen 
shouts defiantly and triumphantly: "Science and 
the fine arts are flourishing ; it is delightful to live !" 
And Luther, although warned not to go to Worms to 
expound the new gospel of protestanism, in order to 
avoid sure death, uttered defiantly the bold words : 
"Even then, if the whole town of Worms be swarm- 
ing with devils, I will go thither!" 

Time and again I feel an ardent desire to read 
once more those words memorable for all time to 
come, those words that Mondini, the great investi- 
gator of anatomical truth, wrote down one hundred 
years ago : "Ossa antem alia, quae sunt infra basilare 
non bene ad Bensum apparent, nisi ilia ossa decoquan- 
tur, sed propter peccalum dismittere consuevi." 

What a great mental agony must thou have suf- 



fered, Mondini, thou great investigator, when writing 
down those lines ! You were compelled to give up the 
anatomical study of some bones at the base of the 
skull, as by the bull of the pope, Boniface VIII, the 
dissection of a human corpse, and even the macera- 
tion of a human bone, was made a capital sin, to be 
punished by the ban of the pope. 

Master Mondini, you were the first who ventured 
to dissect a human body after a millennium had 
passed without anyone having dared touch a corpse 
for anatomical purposes ! You were bold enough to 
dissect two bodies, and that was sufficient to instill 
new life into the science of anatomy, a science that 
had declined into utter insignificance. But this re- 
vival of anatomical research did not last very long, 
as Pope Boniface VIII anathematized it by his bull 
threatening anybody with the ban who might ven- 
ture to dissect a human body or macerate a human 
bone. The church favored blind belief in the infalli- 
bility of the errors and unsound anatomical doctrines 
of the Roman heathen, Galenus, and the church 
sympathizes with those unsound doctrines as they 
have caused stagnation of the human mind for one 
thousand years and have rendered impossible any 
progress in investigating the truth. 

Oh, how it fills my soul with agonizing pain to 
realize under what a disgraceful yoke science has been 
forced by the church ! At present, at the outset of 
the fifteenth century, a mighty reform movement in 
the realm of religion has set in. Luther, in Ger- 
many, for the sake of religious reforms has defied 
the fulmination of the pope and has been bold 
enough to burn the pope's bull, anathematizing him, 



on the market place of Wittenberg, in the presence 
of a large crowd. 

Welly I, loo, have made up my mind lo defy Ihe 
church for Ihe sake of science. 

The necessity for anatomical research is more and 
more acknowledged, and the belief in such a necessity 
is of such strength and endurance that it offers bold 
resistance to ban and persecution. After a thousand 
years of suppression the genius of science celebrates 
its resurrection, and the students and lovers of 
science manifest the noblest competition. 

Here I am, an investigator as well as an outlaw ; I 
am ostracized because I am thinking and investi- 
gating instead of blindly believing ! 

Why is there such an irreconcilable contrast be- 
tween science and belief? How is it that the ortho- 
dox and bigoted hate the non-believer, while the 
knowing man does not harbor any hatred towards 
the ignorant people? If one has the belief that he 
possesses all the truth, why should he hate and per- 
secute those who do not believe, but know ? Why 
not investigate whether what we believe is true 
or not true? At present a thinking and investigating 
mind is a curse ! 

My soul is craving for truth, my mind is longing 
for light ; why am I not entitled to tear away the 
bandage with which the church has blindfolded my 
mind's eye since my earliest childhood ; why should 
I not investigate in order that my mind may drink 
in and admit all the light for which it has such 
ardent desire, instead of remaining beset and stupe- 
fied by mental darkness ! 

All that is alive and noble strives for light ; only 



venomous vermin and the deadly night-shade thrive 
in lightless surroundings. Light is a vital element 
to our bodily welfare as well as to our mind's eye, 
and it is the beacon light of science that 
sends shafts into the dark in search of and for the 
discovery of the truth. 

Why is it that the church is interested in blinding 
the minds of millions of people! It is something 
awful to deprive a man of his eyesight, but it is the 
most heinous crime of which I can think to blind 
the minds of millions of people and to benight the 
mind and soul of whole nations. And this monster 
crime has been perpetrated on mankind for more 
than one thousand years ! He who remonstrates 
against it and strives to free the minds from the 
prison house of spiritual darkness, is soon buried in 
a clammy dungeon and left to languish and rot, or is 
made to breathe his last under the untold tortures of 
the rack or to expire in the flames of the flaring 
stake. All this is hanging over my head. I am 
ostracized; I am outlawed and doomed. My an- 
nihilation is unavoidable. Oh, if I could but live 
in a century to come when an investigator will be 
allowed to indulge in anatomical research in full 
daylight and announce to all the world the truth he 
has discovered ! 

Will that time ever come? Indeed it will come ! 

Here I am in the vault of a grave ; not a single 
ray of the sun comforts and invigorates my eyes, 
which are dimmed and tired by the twilight of this 
dismal abode. I am stigmatized, I am persecuted 
because I am thinkiDg instead of blindly believing. 
Black as the arch of this vault, the skies are hanging 



over my head — like a pall— but there is one bright 
star left in those gloomy skies, my friend Sylvia. 

Shall I retrace my steps in search of scientific 
truth? No, never, never ! Here is the book I cherish 
above all books, the bible in which I believe. Thou 
great mind, Mondini, thou bold investigator of truth, 
the first scientific treatise on anatomy thou hast 
written with your life blood ! Ardently I press it 
against my throbbing heart and swear upon my 
solemn oath : That I will always advocate the liberty 
of conscience and the freedom of thought and 
scientific investigation! 

Here are these bones, which you, great thinker 
and investigator, did not dare to macerate and 
demonstrate from, because by the bull of the pope it 
was declared to be a sin. 

( The cry of a screech owl is heard.) 

It is Anselm with a bad owlish message. {In the 
ceiling of the vault a panel is thrown open and 
Anselm descends on a rope ladder.) 

Anselm. My greeting to you, Master Vesalius. 
Hail ! and good luck to science ! 

Yes. My love to you, dear friend Anselm. 
(Pointing out the two corpses.) You have once 
more ventured much for the sake of science. 

Ans. I did as well as I could, Master Vesalius, 
but now the black cowls are on our track ; the whole 
town has been set astir by the news that last night 
the gallows and the rack were plundered. This time 
they will stir heaven and hell to find out where the 
purloined corpses are hidden. Hark! (The noise 
of heavy footsteps resounding upon the ceiling of 
the vault is heard.) There, above, the grave war- 



dens are tramping about the graveyard to ferret us 
out. We must be on our guard and not venture to 
leave our burrow by the usual way above ; we must 
try to work our way out through the chapel. Master 
Vesalius, in any event I will take all the blame upon 
my shoulders ; it is I who spirited away the corpses 
from the gallows ; I procured them, and I am pre- 
pared and ready to suffer the consequences. The 
church claims as its property the dead as well as the 
living. The cowls expect, their bellies having been 
abused and thrown out of gear by gormandizing and 
debauchery, that we are prepared at any time to put 
them in working order, and yet we are never per- 
mitted to study the human stuffing in nalura. We 
are called in to set their fractured bones and re- 
adjust their dislocated joints without being given an 
opportunity to study in a corpse the shape of the 
bones and the manner in which they are joined 
together. If we take the liberty of studying a single 
bone in nalura, they fling a fulmination at our head 
or break our bones on the torturing rack. 

Yes. The obscurers and enemies of enlightenment 
are still in unrestrained power as regards science, 
but verily the time will come when science will 
break and shake off these disgraceful shackles. All 
over Europe powerful minds, fearless thinkers and 
investigators, have arisen, and are still arising : 
Mondini, Wislicenus, Huss, Savanarola, Luther, 
Zwingle, Melanchthon, Copernicus, Servetus, Ulrich 
von Hutten, Eustachius, Fallopia and others. But 
as soon as a new thinker, investigator or reformer 
arises a sudden flash of lightning speeds along from 
Rome and smites the master mind. 



Ans. This time danger lurks not only above our 
heads, but (pointing to one of the corpses) also over 
there in the corner ! 

Yes. What do you mean, Anselm? 

Ans. ( Motioning towards the opposite corner 
and speaking under his breath.) That corpse over 
there is not a real corpse. 

Yes. Is it a case of apparent death? 

Ans. He is seemingly a dead man, but he either 
feigns death or is filled up with aqua vitae and 
opium and is in a death like stupor. I do not think 
that he will miss very much if I make him sleep 
another twenty-four hours. {Anselm empties the 
contents of a vial into the mouth of the corpse.) 
Very well, old man, sleep soundly for twenty-four 
hours longer. Now you won't be able to betray us, 
for that is what you are here for. ( Turning towards 
Yesalius.) I became suspicious as soon as I took 
him from the rack ; he was cool, but not cold, and 
all his joints were hale and without injury. They 
had put him on the rack without breaking his joints. 
Yes. (Approaches the corpse and lifts one of Us 
eyelids.) He is under the influence of powerful 
narcotics ; you are right, Anselm ; it is a devilish 
artifice of our artful enemies. 

A?is. I was afraid he might awake at this very 
inopportune hour and sound an alarm when the 
grave wardens are right above our heads. Certainly ! 
We must leave as soon as possible, not only this, our 
anatomical workshop, but the town. Our enemies 
are upon our heels, and (motioning at the pseudo 
corpse) that fellow over there is one of our worst 
enemies ; it is his task to reveal our hiding place. 



We cannot escape by way of the graveyard, we must 
work our way through the chapel. That corpse will 
raise hell as soon as he has slept off the effects of 
the opium, and {pointing at the exit in the ceiling) 
he will soon find out that safety valve ! (Anselm 
presses a button and a square stone of Vie masonry 
of Vie vault moves like a door on Us hinges. 'Both 
Vesalius and Anselm slip through the opening in 
the wall into the adjoining chapel.) 

{Change of selling. Vesalius and pins elm in the 
aisle of the chapel, dnselm readjusts the loose 
stone.) 

pins. Well, Master Vesalius, the best you can now 
do is to say a prayer because you have nothing else 
to do. Pray, take a seat in that niche behind the 
pillar ; here is a prayer book. I am going to find 
out if the street entrance of the chapel is clear of 
spies. Oh, look there, just now I notice there yonder, 
in the twilight, a form kneeling before the crucifix ; 
now Vesalius you do not need a prayer book ; there 
is your Madonna. Mastor Vesalius, please walk over 
there and let her realize that her ardent prayer for 
an opportunity of seeing you has been answered. I 
think she, too, has some news for you, though I am 
afraid that her tidiDgs are rather ominous. Master 
Vesalius, I must beg leave. If I do not come back 
again you can rest assured that the way is clear. In 
any event, I shall call on you tonight, for at mid- 
night we must take flight. 

Yes. I thank you with all my heart, friend 
Anselm, for the care you have taken. 

{Exit Anselm. Vesalius walks over to the kneel- 
ing form and lowering himself on one of his knees 



beside Tier says in an undertone: To-day my leading 
star has risen at an unusual hour.) 

Sylvia. It is not the rising morning star presaging 
good luck. It is the evening star going down and 
nearing its setting. ( With emotion. ) Vesalius, all is 
sinking away, the heavens are tottering from their 
bearings ; darkness is creeping over the world and it 
benights my soul. 

Ves. What is it that fills your heart with such 
great agony? 

Sylvia. They are going to tear me away from 
here— from you! Up to this day our hearts were 
throbbing in sympathy, and animated by the same 
impulses ; the same thoughts flashed through our 
minds and the same sentiments comforted our soul. 
All this heaven of bliss is falling to ruins. 

Yes. Who did so cruelly wound your heart, dear 
Sylvia? 

Sylvia. (.Choked with emotion.) My father. 

Ves. My dearest friend, let me know all. 

Sylvia. You must take to flight, your life is in 
hourly danger; this very day you must leave 
I Louvaine. 

Yes. You want me to leave you, my dear friend? 
To separate our hearts means to break them. 

Sylvia. Vesalius, my heart can only continue to 
live if I know that you are in safety. 

Yes. Well, if it is your wish I will leave and 
return at the proper time to have our hearts united 
forever. 

Sylvia. No, no, my dear friend, I also have to 
leave Louvaine and I — shall — never — return ! 

Yes. Oh! thou wilt share my exile? Now a 



heavy burden drops from my heart and I am the 
happiest of mortals. 

Sylvia. Do not speak that way and cause my poor 
heart, rent with awful agony, to bleed. 

Yes. What is it that threatens you? 

Sylvia. My father is going to bury me for life 
within the walls of a convent, in order to save my 
soul, which he says is poisoned with rank heretical 
ideas, from eternal perdition — from you, Vesalius. 

Yes. Where are they going to immure you? I 
will rescue you from your convent prison at the peril 
of my life? 

Sylvia. That I do not know. It is a strict secret. 

Yes. Indeed, the earth begins to quake beneath 
me ; the old, black and venomous monster is looming 
up in all his might and the coils of his gigantic 
body are drawn closer about his victim. Already I 
feel his slimy body and the irresistible strength of 
his paralyzing embrace. Yea, I feel his deadly 
breath and see his venomous fangs above my head. 
When shall be born the Hercules who with his iron 
arms will choke to death this monster ! Science 
will do it! Dear friend, Sylvia, do not be dis- 
heartened, for all the powerful minds of the present 
age are striving with united strength for the freedom 
of thought and belief. 

(& voice from the altar is heard: "Yes, indeed. 
They are striving for hell and eternal perdition!") 

Syt (Embarrassed.) We have been watched. 
We are betrayed. (She unfastens a locket) Here, 
my friend, Vesalius, take this as a keepsake. It is 
the likeness of your friend, who admires you, you 
the undaunted hero striving to free mankind of its 



spiritual thralldom. How impetuously my heart is 
throbbing? It is beating ever for your sake, Vesalius ; 
for the sake of the lonesome hero, ostracized by 
everybody, forsaken by God and all the world, but 
not by me. Good bye ! 

{Pari of the altar cloth is drawn aside and the 
face of a friar peers out for a moment from under 
the altar without being observed either by Sylvia or 
Vesalius. ) 

Yes. {Stunned with agony.) Farewell, my 
guardian angel. Good bye, my guiding star. Upon 
my solemn oath, you will soon shed again your 
heavenly light in all its former glory and splendor 
upon my dark and lonely path. {Exit Sylvia.) 

Yes. {Recovers from his bewilderment and 
walks up to Vie altar, thrusting his sword through 
Hie altar piece.) Take that, you venomous snake. 
Wherever you may be hiding, come out of your hole. 
Disguised in the solemn garb of religion, it is your 
disgraceful business to sink your fangs, with all the 
cunning available, into the hearts of your flock who 
are unaware of your scheming. Your work is the 
work of Satan. You do not aim at the edification 
of the souls of your followers; you try to get full 
sway over their minds, and for that purpose you re- 
sort to all the artifices of hell to imprison their 
minds in the dungeon of superstition. But the 
time will come when the human mind will break the 
walls of its prison-house and shake off the fetters 
with which it is chained. Then the sun of enlighten- 
ment will rise and throw its shafts with unpre- 
cedented splendor upon a new world. Then, advanced 
minds will twist a flaming lash from the sunbeams 



of enlightenment, at the sight of which these vermin 
which shun the light will recede to those underground 
quarters where now scientific research leads a most 
miserable existence, ever persecuted with venomous 
hatred. With that flaming lash will be scourged all 
those miscreants who have sinned against the holy- 
ghost of mankind. 

( The cry of a screech owl is heard in the direction 
of the exit of the chapel. Vesalius leaves in thai 
direction. ) 

The face of the friar now appears from under the 
altar cloth, and rushing forth on his hands and 
knees he halts, looks round and says : 

"Is he gone? Yes, he is gone." 

Jumping to his feet, he rubs his hands, and, 
accompanying his words with grimaces, delivers 
the following rhapsody : 

How those fish struggle and sprawl 

As we draw on the line ! 

Then we play them out, 

And feed out the string, 

Till they fancy they're free 

As the dove on the wing — 

But from our nets there is no escape ; 
We scheme and grab, we swindle and take ; 
A heretic never slips our hooks, 
We hound his heels and in his wake 
We follow ; from town to town, from land to land. 
On every hand our snares are spread 
For such as do not cringe the knee, and lowly bow the head. 

All these sapient, reformatory birds, 
With their illusive creeds and glittering words, 
Of them we make an easy disposition 

Through the systematic workings of our Spanish Inquisition ; 
Not freedom of conscience, but license unrestrained 



Is the goal toward which the heretic is aimed. 

And to our flock of sheep they tell, 
The world needs neither a heaven nor hell ; 
Where then would be our pretext grave 
For treating our dull sheep to a shave? 
Their need for us, and our needs neatly join, 
For someone must gird their skin about his loin. 
It is no trifling task, so we hold, 
To guard a flock within the fold, 

While Satan stands nearby, evil knowledge to impart, 
Diligently seeking the weak spot in their heart, 
Preaching freedom of conscience, and liberty of mind, 
And with sinister sophistries endeavoring to blind, 
Ruthlessly distorting the tenets of the church, 
And prying into secret closets none should ever search. 
And are we not the proxies of the Lord ; 
The privileged ones to expound his word? 
The pulpit is our platform for pyrotechnical display, 
The pen the two-edged sword with which we play. 
We make the world believe that what we say is so, 
For no one can disprove what nobody can know. 
With a pinch of snuff, sir, if you please, 
We cause all Christendom to sneeze ; 
A single flourish of a little crucifix, 
And all Christian peoples we transfix, 
Down on their knees, our aspect is so frightening, 
They fall like supple twigs before a flash of lightning ; 
And for all this the Lord must thank our mediation — 
Ours the execution, his part the creation. 
When a man is stuffed with faith and will not reason, 
You can have choice game in any sort of season 
We loosen a few screws in a subject's head, 
And he's blind as the blind, and deaf as the dead. 
Numberless, in short, are our little twists and turns, 
And, just between ourselves, much coin the device earns. 
The heretics berate us with the names of "sot" and "glutton,' 
They assert that we are fond of wine and juicy mutton ; 
'Tis but another calumny aimed at the faithful sheep 



Whose lives and trusting souls are in our keep. 
For the selling of indulgences they call us awful names, 
For enlightenment of the people they make their noisy claims 
Now what more can they ask — for goodness gracious sake- 
Do we not the world enlighten with the flaring stake? 
For the ills of every mind, both great and small, 
Religion is the ointment that will cure them all ; 
We are masters of its make and of its use, 
Those who will not buy it can offer no excuse. 
But for the wretched heretics we scarcely have a thought, 
Those scoffers of the priests are best by scourging taught; 
Every mother's son who won't turn his footsteps back, 
In the name of the good Lord we put upon the rack. 
If he complains and murmurs of the burdens of our yoke, 
Down in the clammy dungeon him we quickly poke, 
The deeper and the darker the bottom of the pit, 
The more the satisfaction we draw out of it ; 
For such rank reformers of the holy creed, 
Mental and bodily anguish is the crying need. 
Amidst the slimy vipers, here and there a rat and toad, 
Is the sort of habitation that will their spirit goad ; 
If we toss the wretches there— early, late and often — 
'Twill tend their hearts to turn, 'twill tend the ir souls to soften, 
Vesalius. the heretic, and his bewitching fay 
Are fast getting ripe for an auto-da-fe. 



SCENE VI. 

Parlors of a bath-house. Erik, the bath-house 

keeper, drummers andfifers heard in the 

sir eel soliciting the people to lake weekly 

bath, according to the ordinance of 

the magistrate, llnselm enters. 

Jlnselm. Good morning, Erik. How do you do? 
What is the news? 

Erik. Something awful has happened. Last 
night the corpses of the two delinquents who were 
executed yesterday were stolen from the gallows. 

Sins. That is nothing new to me, but I should 
much like to know who stole the corpses. 

Erik. It is the new believers, the heretics, who 
are using the bodies for the concoction of their 
arcana, which they extract from corpses. Yesterday 
I was myself in need of something of that kind; 
Kolf, the cobbler, had cut his hand and I think 
some human grease from the same part of the hand 
of the executed criminal might have worked wonders 
in his case, as it might in many others. Say, 
Master Anselm, what would you have resorted to in 
such a case? 

pins. I should have resorted to my legs. 

Erik. How is that? 

Ans. I should have hurried to the sufferer as fast 
as my legs would carry me, being afraid the cut 
might heal before I got there. If a patient sends 
for you, hurry to his bedside at breakneck speed, 
and as soon as you arrive advise, or, still better, 
prescribe something, as he may otherwise get well on 
his own account. No patient should be allowed to 
find out that it is nature and not the physician that 



heals disease. Nalura sanat, medicus curat, says 
Hippocrates, the greatest physician who ever lived ; 
to wit, it is nature that heals disease while the phy- 
sician merely attends to the case. 

Administer to the patient some of the so-called 
remedies, or, still better, give him lots of them, as he 
thinks a lot of stuff does him a lot of good, and, by 
the way, do not forget to occupy the full time nature 
requires in performing her healing work. What 
nature does not know, nobody knows, and what 
nature can not achieve, nobody can achieve. 

Whatever you prescribe, the great majority of 
cases get well in any event, sooner or later, but if 
the silly people get well after having taken one or 
the other of the so-called "remedies" they invariably 
say that they got well by having taken the stuff. 

This wrong conclusion is the main secret of 
medical practice and gives us bread. 

Of course we ourselves know well that these suf- 
ferers get well because nature cures them while they 
are taking the stuff. In many cases they get well in 
spite of taking so-called remedies, because if the 
patient is a poor devil his physician may say: 
Experimenium faciamus in anima vili. Why not 
experiment on that poor devil that doesn't amount 
to anything ! As it happened with a friend, who 
understood Latin. But he got right up and escap- 
ed the experiments of his officious physicians. 

If the patient should find out the fallacy of the 
"post hoc, ergo propter lioc" argument— I got well 
after having taken medicine, consequently I got well 
by taking medicine— our coffers would instantly 
suffer from incurable consumption ; for if general 



health prevails, and our fellowmen are well, we phy- 
sicians are bad off, but if plenty of people are suffer- 
ing, we physicians are well off. It is disease that fills 
our coffers, while health leaves them empty. 

Mr. Quacky, can you put it together, such bleating 
idiotism, when they tell us the same poisonous drugs 
that make a strong and healthy man sick, namely a 
man that has strong nerves, plenty of rich blood, 
sound sleep and a perfect digestion, will cure a sick 
man that lacks all these fine attributes? 

There are no such things as healing potions, but 
there are healing and restorative powers innate in 
every living being and every living tissue. 

As I was saying, Mr. Quacky, if a sufferer sends 
for you, hurry to him as fast as you can ; that will 
make him believe that his case is rather serious and 
that you hasten to his bedside in order to save him, 
while as a matter of fact you are afraid in many 
cases that if Nature is allowed to take her course 
the patient may recover before you reach his bed- 
side. Nature does the work and works the miracles, 
and we physicians get the credit for it, and the 
coin, too. 

Erik. Indeed, every day miracles are wrought ! 
Right over there is an instance ; look at him ! Yes- 
terday he was executed, and then dragged into a 
grave vault by the hyenas of the graveyard for the 
purpose of dissection, parts of his anatomy to be 
used for their necromantic tricks. Now that corpse 
is sitting over there and enjoys a cupping, because 
while dead his blood had become thick and unfit for 
circulation. 

ttnselm. ( Under his breath and to himself, iak- 



ing a glance at the customer.) Upon my soul, if 
I have one, that is indeed corpse number two, whom 
I placed in the corner of our workshop in the grave 
vault, and about whom I gave Master Vesalius a 
warning ! This fellow must have a most peculiar 
set of nerves, as I administered to him a dose of 
dope that would have sent anybody else to sleep for 
at least forty-eight hours. Now he is looking at me 1 
It sends a shudder down my back! Fortunately he 
does not know me by sight, but he might recognize 
my voice ! 

Erik. Do you hear, Master Anselm, what he 
says? The miscreants who have stolen the corpses 
from the gallows have been caught, and they will 
be hanged tomorrow. 

Anselm. ( To himself. ) Now it is high time to 
be keeping out of the way of this live corpse, other- 
wise I may be a corpse tomorrow. I will hurry to Mas- 
ter Vesalius and tell him that we have to leave 
Louvaine as soon as possible. ( Under his breath to 
Mr. Erik.) Good bye, Quacky, I am in a hurry! 



ACT II, 

SCENE I. Auditorium of Professor Sylvius. 

Prof. Sylvius. Commililones honor alissimi! I 
thank you for the honor you show me by your ap- 
pearance in such great numbers, and I take great 
pleasure in inaugurating you still further in the 
wonders and mysteries of the human anatomy. We 
are informed by the Holy Writ that the Lord has 
made man his image, as is shown by these anatom- 
ical plates drawn by Galenus, the greatest authority 
on the anatomy of man. 

Vlnselm. Professor Sylvius, pray let me make 
but one remark as regards those anatomical plates. 

Prof. Sylv. Most certainly ! I have informed 
this most honorable audience on more than one oc- 
casion that I am at any time ready and prepared to 
answer any questions that arise among the audience 
and to settle any kind of doubt; for we pursue our 
studies and investigations in common. 

tfLnselm. These anatomical plates appear to me 
more like the likeness of a monkey than the image 
of God. 

{Great sensation among the audience and loud 
exclamations of disapproval by some of them.) 

Prof. Sylv. My dear friend, are you in earnest 
with your remarks ; if so, then you doubt the teach- 
ings of the greatest authority in anatomical science, 
and you profane science. I assure you that I am 
the most pronounced enemy of all heresy in science 
as well as in religion. 



tfLnselm. As regards human anatomy I have a 
better authority at hand than Galenus. 

Prof. Sylv. Are you out of your mind? Not one 
word more ; I cannot and will not sutler that my 
auditorium, a renowned temple of science, be dis- 
graced by such a shocking defamation. If I cared 
to descend to a discussion of your atrocious remarks, 
I should only have to put the question, "well, where 
is your authority?" in order to annihilate you by 
bringing ridicule upon you. 

yl?iselm. There is my authority, Master Vesalius. 
He is the man to fully prove the truth of my as- 
sertion that Galenus is an authority in the anatomy 
of monkeys, while Master Vesalius is the greatest 
authority in the anatomy of man. ( Turning to the 
students.) Dear friends! I know for certain that 
you are out for the truth and that you are in favor 
of untrammeled investigation. You shall, therefore, 
find out yourselves what splendid progress anatomi- 
cal research has made in recent times. 

{tins elm pulls a bandage of black silk from Ms 
pocket and steps toward Vesalius.) 

flnselm. Master Vesalius, please let me blind- 
fold you for a few minutes ! ( He puts the bandage 
over Vesalius' eyes and lakes a number of small 
bones from Ms pocket; placing them in front of 
Vesalius he turns to the students. Tlie majority 
of them gather about Vesalius, a small number 
surround Professor Sylvius.) Look here, these 
are human bones, the bones of the carpus of the 
right and left hand, and here are the bones of the 
tarsus of the right and left foot. It is rather dif- 
ficult to tell which one of these bones beloDgs to the 



right or left hand or to the right or left foot, how- 
ever closely you scrutinize them, but Master Vesal- 
ius is able— even with eyes blindfolded — to tell you 
in a moment where they belong. 

Now, comrades, place one bone, whichever you 
choose, in the hand of Master Vesalius and repeat 
the operation as often as you please. 

(One of the bones in front of Vesalius is placed 
in his hand. He feels it for a moment) 

Vesalius. This is the os cubuideum of the tarsus 
of the left foot. (Another bone is placed in his 
hand.) This is the os pisiforme of the carpus of 
the left hand. (Another is given him.) This is the 
os hamalum of the right carpus, (Another.) This 
is the os naviculare of the right tarsus. (Again.) 
This is the os calcaneum of the same tarsus. 

[The students have been watching the whole per- 
formance with the utmost admiration and a keen 
interest prevails among them, even Professor Syl- 
vius cannot conceal his astonishment] 

Prof. Sylv. Are these bones genuine human 
bones or mere imitations? 

Vesalius. They are genuine human bones. 

Prof. Sylv. This proves that they have been ac- 
quired by the profanation of graves and of the dead, 
and we do not care for your new brand of anatom- 
ical research, a brand that has been cultivated by 
outrageous and criminal methods. 

u Qui proficil in Uteris el deficit in moribus, 
Plus deficit quam proficil." 

Vesalius. For that very reason we are in favor of 
the untrammeled investigation of truth, and strong- 
ly opposed to a method of teaching which for centur- 
ies has taught anatomical untruths and errors aB 



anatomical fads, and has persecuted genuine re- 
search in order to prevent progress of the human 
mind. 

The anatomy which you, Professor Sylvius, teach 
the medical students is the anatomy of dogs and 
monkeys, but not the anatomy of man. Please 
glance over your anatomical plates and you will see 
that all those characteristic points are lacking that 
make the skeleton of man differ from the skeletons 
of animals, and especially from that of the monkey. 

For instance, the remarkable volume of the hu- 
man skull compared with the face, the forehead 
more vertical in man, while sloping or entirely 
wanting in animals. In addition, those projections 
and ledges of the skull of man are wanting, which 
serve in animals for the insertion of muscles and 
the ligamentum nuchae, which the human head, 
pivoting in its center of gravity and balanced in its 
bearings on the spinal column, does not need. 
Moreover, in man the jaws do not protrude, as is 
the case in animals, and the human head has a chin 
while animals have none ; in men the thumb is 
more developed than in monkeys, and look here, 
( he picks up one of the bones in front of him,) the 
OS calcaneum in man is bigger than in monkeys. 

Now compare it with that on your plates of so- 
called human anatomy. The thigh-bone is the long- 
est bone in man, but not in monkeys, as the bone of 
the upper arm in monkeys exceeds the femur in 
length, or at any rate equals it. 

Look here ! fVesalius pulls from under his coat a 
femur and brandishes it.) This is a human thigh- 
bone ! Please judge for yourself, Professor Sylvius, 



whether GaleDus, your authority of one thousand 
years, or the new anatomical school, is mistaken. 
(Great applause from llie students.) 
Prof. Sylv. (Pecrossing himself.) A genuine 
human bone! Horribile dictu! (Turning to the 
students.} What good Christian would care to en- 
dorse a new anatomical school which profanes man, 
the image of God, and which improves itself by the 
profanation of the dead! 

Here, Vesalius, let me take this bone in my hand 
to convince myself that it is not an artifice of hell, 
with which you seem to be allied. (Becrossing him- 
self, and plucking up an end of his garb to prevent 
coming in close contact with the bone, he picks it 
up.) 

Prof. Sylv. (In elevated tones. ) Now I hold the 
corpus delicti in my hands, as an evidence that you, 
Vesalius, are a profaner of the dead and a hyena of 
the graveyard, and this corpus delicti will suffice to 
cut short your disgraceful career ! [Here he quickly 
turns, and, pushing open a door concealed in the 
wall, slips through with femur in hand. ?1 great 
tumult arises, vlnselm draws his sword and all 
the students do the sa?ne.] 

Anselm. (Shouting.) What an outrage ! [Flour- 
ishing his sword he makes for the door through 
which Professor Sylvius has disappeared, and 
where a small number of students meet him with 
swords drawn. The majority of the students 
crowd in the same direction shouting: "Zfnlram- 
meled liberty of scientific research!" ^.i this 
point Vesalius steps between the two factions^ 
Vesalius. Indeed, full freedom for the investiga- 



tion of truth, but, my dear friends, Bwords are not 
the weapons of science ! 

£ tremendous ovation is tendered Vesalius by 
his followers, who carrying him in their midst 
leave the auditorium shouting: 

"For the future Vesalius shall be our teacher, 
let us find an auditorium for him!" 



SCENE II. 



Yes. Well, Anselm, are you satisfied with our 
first skirmish with the old anatomical school? 

Ans. Master Vesalius, I am overjoyed. This was 
a battle to my heart's content. The old school of 
Galenus, with its anatomy of dogs and monkeys, 
has suffered a fearful defeat ; a defeat from which 
it will never recover. The so-called anatomy of 
man has now been demonstrated to be the anatomy 
of dogs and monkeys. It was the first human bone 
that has been shown to medical students for one 
thousand years. The students are greatly exasper- 
ated because of the deceit practiced for a thousand 
years. The human thigh-bone you brandished 
worked like the famous jaw-bone of an ass of Sam- 
son to put to flight Professor Sylvius and the rest of 
the medical Philistines. Like Samson, with gigan- 
tic force you took hold of one of the principal pil- 
lars of the magnificent temple of medicine, and the 
vast edifice fell, like an old shed, clattering to the 
ground. How proud and self-conceited did Profes- 
sor Sylvius oracle from his chair, as if he were sit- 
ting on the Delphic tripod, and as he, in spite of 
your momentous arguments, did not come down vol- 



untarily from his gilded tripod, the students pulled 
him down, shouting : "Down with the anatomical 
humbug!" Indeed we have battered a breach in 
that strong bulwark of anatomical hocus pocus, and 
I shout with Ulrich de Hutten : "The fine arts and 
science are nourishing; it is delightful to live!" As 
a matter of course the Old School is greatly incensed 
and we will have to encounter an exasperating and 
malicious attack from our enemies. Oh, how I do 
glory in you, Master Vesalius; the results of your 
untiring investigation and of your thorough dissec- 
tions of the human body have gained the victory 
over the unsound teachings of the old anatomical 
school of Galenus. For more than a millennium 
those unsound doctrines have claimed and main- 
tained infallibility, and the church was delighted 
thereat, because it brought scientific research to a 
standstill. 

Master Vesalius, with all my heart I congratulate 
you upon your well deserved triumph. Now you 
have good reason to feel happy and to look back with 
proud confidence over the road you have traveled. 

Yes. It is a victory towards which you have con- 
tributed a fair share, my friend Anselm, but perfect 
happiness can be born only in the heart, and you 
know, my friend Anselm, that my heart is languish- 
ing with untold agony, for apparently the guiding 
star of my life has set forever. The deadly anxiety 
arising from uncertainty whether Sylvia is still 
among the living, imprisoned and buried alive 
behind the silent walls of the convent, or whether 
her noble soul has already succumbed under her un- 
told agony, preys upon my life and paralyzes my 



heart strings like a deadly, insidious poison. All 
our investigations at Montpellier and at Cologne have 
been in vain ; with a mind half stunned I have pur- 
sued my studies at those universities. In Paris, too, 
all your inquiries have been futile. It is true I did 
not ask you about the result of your investigations 
in Paris, but when I noticed that you avoided my 
inquiring looks I realized that all my hope and 
happiness were forever gone. How boundless would 
be my happiness if in addition to you, my dear 
friend Anselm, Sylvia could share the victory of the 
truth. You fully understand my heart, dear Anselm. 
Do feel as I do, and you will not be angry with me, 
if, after you have done everything in your power to 
find a trace of poor, suffering Sylvia, I beg you once 
more, urgently and instantly, to 'try for the last time 
to learn something about the whereabouts or fate of 
Sylvia. Take these thousand florins in gold. It is 
all that I have left, and I wish that I could place 
one thousand times that amount of money in your 
hands. Promise that amount to anybody who is 
able to give you information of a novice of the name 
Anastasia, who has been inaugurated in one of the 
convents of Paris or its outskirts. See the abbesses 
of all the nunneries and flourish the money ! They 
are greedy, those pious ladies ! 

$Lns. Certainly, Master Vesalius, I will not rest 
satisfied until I have succeeded in comforting your 
heart ; this bait will do its work. I go on the in- 
stant to throw out my angling line. {He leaves.) 

Yes. Sylvia, thou fair queen of my heart, oh if 
you were only here to enjoy with me the first victory 
the untrammeled investigation of truth has gained, 



the cause to which you have devoted your life and 
sacrificed your life blood ! What avails a triumph 
of the intellect while the heart is bleeding! Sylvia, 
do send me one single message of your soul, telling 
me if you are at this moment giving me a thought. 
How often a message of thine has tinkled in my 
ears! There is no wire attached to the little bell 
that murmurs in my ears, but it is sensitive to your 
mind, from which your thoughts beam forth like 
sunbeams; forming, like sunrays, a shimmering 
path along which speed all the sentiments of your 
soul into mine. When your message rings in my 
ear then I know that wherever you may be you re- 
member me and our minds are in spiritual com- 
munion. Just now, Sylvia, is one of your mes- 
sages sounding in my ears, and, alas, I am unable 
to decipher it! Give me, I pray, some intimation 
whether you are still on this planet ; give me that 
joyful tidings! For any tidings from you are gos- 
pel to me. Without the sunshine beaming forth 
from your eyes, no happiness for me is conceivable, 
and no life of mine possible. Indeed, my life is 
rooted in my unlimited love for you, and upon you 
rests all my future. It was that very love that gave 
me the strength and the inspiration I needed to 
achieve what I have achieved ; achieved through 
thee! 

You alone were able to understand my ardent 
longing for truth, and my indomitable desire for 
the freedom of thought, and my unshaken hope in 
the deliverance from restraint of conscience and be- 
lief. Is there a greater blissfullness conceivable 
than that which lies in the thorough understanding 



of two congenial minds? With them every thought 
that emerges from the labyrinth of the mind finds a 
full understanding, and re-echoes in the mind of his 
spiritual double ; every sentiment welling up from 
the occult depth of the soul and from the holy 
shrine of the heart of the one causes the chords of 
the kindred soul to respond in sweet sympathy and 
blissful harmony. Indeed, the most exalted hap- 
piness in our life is the inexhaustible blissfullness 
of the sympathy of mind and soul of a true loving 
heart. 

How often but one thought of thee, my Sylvia, 
has steeled my faltering arm, tired by unceasing 
work of research midst rot and mold ! At times my 
courage has waned under the pressure of continuous 
rank and malicious persecution, but a single word 
of encouragement uttered by thee, thou fair one, has 
always inspired me, as if by magic power, with new 
strength and confidence, (pi knock at the door; a 
messenger with a large document enters and hands 
the document to Vesalius; messenger departs. 
Vesalius opens the document.) Ah, a summons to 
appear before the Sorbonne ! Professor Sylvius is 
in a hurry to have me brought before that tribunal 
of medical heresy. I know very well what they are 
going to do. They will try to make me renounce all 
my anatomical teachings, otherwise they will expel 
me from the medical fraternity. I know I shall be 
excommunicated, cum infamia, if I do not re- 
nounce my teachings. But, my dear confreres, you 
will not succeed. They do not hang anybody until 
they have caught him. I shall not appear before 
your tribunal which is going to ostracize so-called 



medical heresy. If they would but place a corpse at 
my disposal, I should not hesitate for one moment ; 
for then I could demonstrate to the fullest extent, 
before the very eyes of those periwigs, that all the 
venerable and time-honored anatomical truths 
handed down through so many centuries are nothing 
but errors. But they do not want to see the truth ; 
neither do they care to listen to the truth and be- 
come convinced of it. The church hates any kind of 
progress, as it does away with stagnation of the hu- 
man mind. The moral earthquake of the public 
mind, embodied in the religious reform movement, 
has shocked the church more than the physical 
earthquake, the recent convulsions of our planet at 
Lisbon. The church is alarmed and embarrassed at 
the flood of new ideas, inventions and discoveries, 
born, under hard labor, from the lap of the present 
time. The invention of gunpowder makes the weak- 
est man a giant ; the invention of the printing press 
spreads knowledge that has hitherto been considered 
the privilege and sole property of the monks and of 
the guild of scholars; in addition, the printing 
press has spread the new gospel of Luther with mar- 
velous rapidity, a new world has been discovered, 
and the astronomical teachings of the bible are 
going to be proven erroneous by the admirable as- 
tronomical discoveries of the ingenious mastermind 
of that great astronomer, Copernicus, though he is 
prudent enough not to divulge them at present, be- 
ing well aware that it would mean his sure death at 
the stake. His unequaled genius has discovered the 
natural laws that govern the marvelous perpetual 
motion of the universe ; and that hitherto huge 



body, the earth, that we called the world and the 
center of the universe, his master mind has reduced, 
contrary to the bible's so-called revelations of the 
Lord, to a comparatively very small affair among 
the celestial bodies. Anatomical research has been 
revived, but the church has immediately anathema- 
tized it. Rome is quivering with rage and fear, as 
the world does not fall to pieces either from the as- 
tronomical heresy of Copernicus or from the relig- 
ious heresies of the arch-heretic, Luther, who went 
so far in his boldness as to even call the pope the 
Anti-Christ and cremate publicly the bull of the 
pope issued to excommunicate him. Popery and 
priestcraft are shaken to their foundation, yet there 
are many belonging to the craft of scholars who 
take the side of the church, or who, at least, do not 
dare to shake off the shackles with which they have 
been loaded. The Sorbonne might have saved its 
pains, for I shall not appear before that Tribunal of 
Inquisition to be indicted and punished for scien- 
tific heresy. 



SCENE III. 

The Sorbonne. 

Professor Sylvius' auditorium. On a table covered 
with dark cloth rests the human femur; 
a number of members of the Sor- 
bonne surround the table, 
plmong them Trof. 
Sylvius. 

Doyen. Collegae honor alissimi! A most impor- 
tant matter upon which to deliberate is come before 
us. The matter in question involves not only the 
interests of the medical faculty, but also the vital 
interests of our university, the chief exponent of 
theology in Europe. 

Gentlemen, pray look over there and behold the 
corpus delicti, a genuine human bone! Horribile 
dictu! (Some of the members of the Sorbonne 
draw nearer, and gaze at the femur with manifes- 
tations of wonder and abhorrence.) 

An ambulatory student, his name is Vesalius, 
who attends the lectures of our most respected col- 
league, Professor Sylvius, has before the whole 
audience pronounced the anatomy taught by our 
dear colleague, Professor Sylvius, to be not the anat- 
omy of man, but the anatomy of dogs and monkeys. 
To prove his assertion he has been nourishing that 
genuine human bone during his argument. 

Dear colleagues, what is your opinion, and what 
should be done in the matter? 

A Member op Sorbonne. Est heretic a capiie ad 
calcem. II est une bete noire. ^Dominus vobiscum. 
He is a heretic from head to foot. He is a black 



beast, an object of abhorrence. God be with you! 

Another Member. Fiat jusiitia, rual coelum! 
Let justice be done, though the heavens fall! Omnia 
ad Dei gloriam! All things to the glory of God! 

Doyen. Who knows if this iB a genuine human 
bone? Do you know whether or not it is a human 
bone, mon cher ami, le professeur Sylvius? Did 
you ever see before this a genuine human bone? 

Prof. Sylvius. {Somewhat embarrassed.) I ad- 
mit I did not, but Vesalius says himself that it is a 
genuine human bone. 

Doyen, ttbsenle reo, in the absence of the de- 
fendant let us be just ; accusare nemo se debet, no 
one is bound to incriminate himself. 

Prof. Sylvius. Are we going to wait till the 
heavens fall ? Is this corpus delicti {pointing at 
the bone) not an evident proof that that miscreant 
is a grave robber, deserving capital punishment? 

To all appearances the anti-Christ has been turned 
loose and religion and science are shaken to their 
foundations. Every one of you, my dear colleagues, 
knows the frightful encroachments the heretics have 
made upon our Holy Church. But recently one of 
my professional friends has informed me that Coper- 
nicus, a man of high position among the clergy, in- 
dulges in the most awful pursuits, committing the 
blasphemy of reaching out for the celestial mys- 
teries by searching the realm of the Lord with spy- 
glasses. And listen, gentlemen, he is going to pub- 
lish the results of all his necromantic artifices as 
astronomical facts. He asserts that the sun and not 
the earth is the centre of the universe, and that the 
earth revolves around the sun. instead of the sun 



revolving around the earth, as it has been revealed 
to us by the Lord in the holy writs. 

( The audience gives evidence of being greatly 
shocked, and exclamations are heard, such as: 
"Horribile dictu! Indeed it is the greatest blas- 
phemy ! It is awful that Christians use spy -glasses 
in order to find out celestial mysteries and spy 
about the realm of the Lord.") 

Prof. Sylvius. Eh bien, messieurs! Do you not 
realize that the prince of darkness is right among us, 
undermining the foundation of our Holy Church? 
How about Huss and Savanarola, Luther, Melanch- 
thon, Calvin and Zwingli, all of them at the start 
being shining lights of theology and then becoming 
renegades? 

If all of them should have met with the same fate 
as Huss, Savanarola and Zwingli, then I should be 
satisfied. 

Zwingli was treated just as he deserved and just 
in the manner that pleases me — wounded on the 
battlefield he lay weak and bleeding when approach- 
ed by a captain, who, with drawn sword, ordered 
that he pronounce the name of the Holy Virgin in 
righteous repentance. Upon his refusal so to do, 
the captain thrust his sword through his neck, 
killing him. Others then fell upon him and quar- 
tered him. His remains were then burned, and the 
ashes mixed with the ashes of a pig, thus putting it 
completely beyond the power of his followers to 
gather them. 

The mere thought of Ulrich de Hutten makes me 
shudder, and gunpowder— seemingly the invention 
of the monk Berthod Schwartz— is in fact the out- 



come of the blackest of hellish artifices ; it is the 
invention of Satan himself, with whom the monk 
was closely allied. 

And the invention of the art of printing, is it not 
another brand of blackest hellish artifice? 

And how about the consequences of all these evil 
conditions? Is it not evident what they are to be? 
Iconoclasm, the uprising of the peasantry, the spread 
of rank hereticism, and so forth, foreshadow the im- 
pending ruin of our Holy Church. 

Doyen. I propose to deliver that corpus delicti, 
a genuine human bone, to the Holy Inquisition! 
That will suffice to cut short the iniquitous career of 
that wicked heretic and necromancer, Vesalius. 

For the present I think it just and wise to give 
our most respected colleague, Professor Sylvius, 
carte blanche to prevent Vesalius from spreading 
further his venomous teachings by having him put 
away in some shady place. Gentlemen, I thank you 
for all the zeal you have shown to protect our 
famous university against the inroads of rank heresy. 
If you agree in my proposition, please let me have 
your opinion. 

The Audience. Agreed ! 

Doyen. Eh bien, messieurs, adieu el au revoir! 



SCENE IV. 

Convent of the Carmelite Nuns in Paris. Recep- 
tion room of Vie abbess. Abbess and 
Anselm, then Selma, then 
Professor Sylvius. 

Abbess. I have complied with your request and 
have inquired at all the convents of Paris and its 
outskirts. In none of them is there a novice of the 
name Anastasia, and none of the new comers corre- 
sponds with the description you have given me. 

Anselm. What a pity that I can not hand over 
the thousand florins in gold, which are to be given 
as a reward to the one who is able to locate Miss 
Anastasia. 

Abbess. To judge from your accent you are a 
stranger in this country. 

Ans. I am a stranger, but I do not feel strange 
facing such a kind and hospitable lady. 

Abbess. Thank you, I hope you will soon call 
again. Such a polite and much travelled gentleman 
is welcome at any time. Apropos, you might do well 
to deposit the thousand florins in gold with me, to 
be invested in our holy cause, which would yield to 
you all the blessiugs of heaven. 

Ans. Very kind, indeed, right reverend abbess, 
but I am obliged to refund the money to the party 
who gave me the order to investigate, as I have not 
succeeded in locating Miss Anastasia. 

Abbess. For your personal comfort I am in posi- 
tion to offer you any kind and any amount of letters 
of indulgence at a very low figure. 

Ans. I am sorry that I am not able to accept 



your kind offer, as I possess a stock of that article 
which will last me for the remainder of my life. At 
Cologne I bought from the famous indulgence 
mongster, Tetzel, a bushel of letters of indulgence. 
It is always a good thing to have a chunk of indul- 
gence for every day life. I also bought the latest 
brand of Tetzel's letter of indulgence with the motto : 

"As soon as the money drops into Tetzel's coffer, 
The exonerated soul jumps into heaven." 

Thus I have not only lots of indulgence for the 
remainder of my life, but heaven is secured for me. 
It is always advisable to provide for the future. 

Mbess. (Somewhat nellled.) Well, the thought 
would never have entered my mind that such a per- 
fect gentleman needs so many letters of indulgence ; 
besides Tetzel's letters of indulgence are rather high 
priced. 

tins. I don't think so. His latest price list puts 
the price for a letter of indulgence to save a soul from 
purgatory as low as ten cents, for polygamy four 
ducats, for perjury nine ducats, for murder eight 
ducats, for witchcraft two ducats. 

ttbbess* Simson in Switzerland sells letters of 
indulgence still cheaper ; for instance, for infanticide 
four francs, for parricide and fratricide one ducat. 

ylns. Indeed the art of printing is a wonderful 
invention. Letters of indulgence are at the present 
printed by cartloads, consequently the poor souls can 
be saved, too, by the cartload, and if some one is 
bent on murder, and has something in his pocket- 
book, he can have a treat at aiay time. 

flbbess. Sir, you say the printing art is a won- 
derful invention. I say it is a hellish artifice. It is 



a trick of the devil himself. In the art of printing 
Satan gave the heretics a means to spread their 
satanic heresies all over the Christian world in an 
incredibly short time, but I understand that the 
other day the devil called on that miscreant, Guten- 
berg, and twisted his neck. 

£ns, There you are mistaken, madam. The old 
boy did not do anything of that kind, God bless 
him! 

Abbess. Sir, for heaven's sake, what are you talk- 
ing about ! 

pins. I say God bless the devil. The old boy 
badly needs some blessing, because we mortals curse 
him all the time. 

Abbess. Are you sometimes absent-minded? 

pins. Not that I know of, madam. 

Abbess. You speak of time-honored and vener- 
able institutions of the Holy Church in such a 
strange and outlandish way that I do not know what 
to think of you. 

(One of the sisters enters and announces Selma, 
the nurse of Sylvia.) 

ttbbess. What does she want? 

Sister. She calls in the affair of Sylvia, the 
niece of Prof. Sylvius. 

Abbess. {Turning to rfLnselm.) You will have 
to excuse me; please step into the adjoining room. 

(ttnselm enters the adjoining room, but leaves the 
door a little open. Selma enters.) 

Selma. Good day, madam. 

Abbess. God bless you! You are by yourself? 
Where is your mistress? 

Selma. Miss Anastasia is still suffering. She 



will not be able to become a novice of thiB convent 
for at least a week. 

Abbess. She does not seem to be in a great hurry- 
to repent and expiate her sins. 

Selma. Miss Anastasia has not committed any 
sins and consequently she has nothing to repent or 
expiate. 

Abbess. What godless and heretical words! 
Small wonder! you come over to this country from 
the Netherlands or Germany. All men are sinners 
before the Lord; they have been born in sin. 

Selma. Miss Anastasia has not been born in sin, 
she was born in Louvaine. 

Abbess. What bold language ! You will have to suf- 
fer. You say Anastasia is the name of your mistress? 

Selma. It is. 

Abbess. ( To herself.) Well, now I have got the 
thousand florins in gold. (Aloud.) I shall have a 
word with Prof. Sylvius as regards his niece. 

(One of the sisters announces Prof . Sylvius.) 

Abbess. Tell him he is welcome. I shall be de- 
lighted to see him. (Turning lo Selma.) Well, 
step into the adjoining room, I can not keep this 
great man waiting for one moment. He comes just 
in time, your master. 

Selma. He is not my master. 

Abbess. What are you mumbling ! You are a 
wicked creature. Hurry ! 

(Selma enters the adjoining room and meets 
Anselm. Prof. Sylvius enters.) 

Prof. Sylvius. Ah, my right reverend Abbess, 
how delighted I am to see you, you faithful, god- 
fearing soul. 



Abbess. You do me the honor of calling on me. 
What can I do for you ! 

Prof. Sylvius. I am calling to get some informa- 
tion about my niece, Anaetasia, whose guardian I 
am. There ought to be an immediate change in 
affairs, otherwise that heretic will be lost forever. 
My brother sent her from Louvaine to Paris in order 
that I might place her in a convent to expiate her 
unfaithfulness and her heresy. 

Abbess. Her name is Anastasia? 

Prof. Sylvius. Yes, most reverend Abbess, my 
niece calls herself Anastasia, the resurrected one. 
{Abbess to herself, "Now I am sure Twill gel IJie 
Ihousand florins in gold!") She says that shortly 
.after she was born — that means at a time when she 
could neither give nor refuse her consent — they bap- 
tized her, and thus shackled her mind by confessional 
bondage. Fettered by those shackles her mind lan- 
guished for years and years until she finally broke 
the bonds. She says her mind was, during all that 
time, penned up in the prison-house of religious 
faith, entombed and buried alive, until she broke 
the vault and celebrated her own resurrection, and 
she therefore calls herself "Anastasia," the resur- 
rected one. 

Abbess. For heaven's sake, what awful wicked- 
ness, and it will be my part to convert that God 
forsaken soul, and lead her back unto the path of 
righteousness. 

Prof. Sylvius. Most reverend Abbess, my niece 
cannot be converted. She is hopelessly suffering 
from the Lutheran plague ; she ought to be quaran- 
tined and isolated in a convent and thus made in- 



offensive. We must take her to the convent, wil- 
lingly or unwillingly, and this time we will in fact 
entomb and bury her alive, in your convent, a grave 
from which she will not resurrect. 

JLbbess. Everything shall be done as you say, 
monsieur le professeur; and all for the sake and 
glory of the Lord! 

Prof, Sylvius. Amen ! But this is not all. In- 
deed we are living in a most awful time ; the Holy 
Church is shaken to its foundation and the wretches 
even try to destroy the time-honored teachings of 
science and to replace them by irreligious doctrines 
and devilish heresies. 

Mbess. Monsieur, le professeur, you frighten the 
]ife out of me. It seems as if the end of the world 
were Dear. 

r Prof. Sylvius. So it seems ; the anti-Christ is 
amoDg us. But even this is not all ; these wicked 
heretics are not satisfied with laying their sacreligi- 
ous hands on all earthly creation of the Almighty 
— on the anatomy of the human body — nay, those 
apostates of the Holy Church in their frenzied 
audacity reach out their sacreligious hands for the 
heavenly bodies and try to tear the whole universe 
from its bearings. The heretic astronomer, Coper- 
nicus, is about to set forth that it is not the sun that 
encircles the earth, but the earth that encompasses 
the sun. Thus he throws all the godly truths that 
are revealed in the holy writ to the dogs. If one 
smashes but one single pillar of the magnificent 
temple of the universe, then the whole world and 
the heavens above our heads must fall to pieces. 

Mbess. And what an unholy, tremendous noise 



it would cause, and what would become of the Lord 
and all his holy angels if their heavenly home 
should collapse about their heads. 

Prof. Sylvius. For half a century I have, as a 
member of the medical faculty, enjoyed the highest 
authority, and with admiration and silent devotion 
the students have marveled at and listened to my 
words, when I demonstrated the anatomy of the 
human body, the great masterpiece of creation, the 
image of God. What happened the other day? All 
my scientific authority was ridiculed and belittled 
and annihilated and all this in my own lecturing 
hall! And who did it? A traveling scholar, a 
heretic with the name Vesalius. His auditorium is 
now crowded with students and my lecturing hall 
has become deserted, 

Mbess. Is it possible, here in Paris, at the metro- 
polis of the holy France ! 

Frof. Sylvius. Indeed this stray anatomist, 
Vesalius, has not only instilled in our medical stu- 
dents the virus of scientific heresy, but he is also a 
religious heretic, because he has spread among the 
medical students the blasphemous and anti-religious 
idea that it is of greater importance to think and in- 
vestigate and find out the truth than to keep on be- 
lieving all the time, and he maintains there ought 
not to be any barriers to thought and investigation. 
"He," he says, "who still calls a shred of brain his 
own, ought to think." In such a way that monster 
of infidelity kept on talking to my students, and 
turning to me he shouted: "Prof. Sylvius, the ana- 
tomy you teach is not the anatomy of the human 
body, but the anatomy of the dogs and monkeys ; 



your authority in anatomical matters is the Roman 
physician, Galenus, who wrote, one thousand years 
ago, a treatise on anatomy, but who had never dis- 
sected a single human corpse ; but I have dissected 
more than one ;" and pulling a large bone from under 
his robe, and brandishing it, he added : "Look here ! 
This is not a bone of a dog or monkey, but a genuine 
human bone. What we need is a free and un- 
trammeled path for investigation and science!" 

ttbbess. And the students did not knock down 
such a devil? 

Prof. Sylvius. No, madame, they did not. On 
the contrary they tendered him an ovation, and 
shouting at the top of their voices : "Hurrah ! a free 
and untrammeled path for investigation and science !" 
they left my auditorium to join that stray adven- 
turer, and but few faithful students remained. 
Vesalius has established a medical class, with the 
result that his auditorium is crowded with students 
and mine is deserted. 

Abbess. "A free and untrammeled path for inves- 
tigation," indeed! (%>ecrossing herself.) An untram- 
meled path to hell and eternal perdition ! 

Prof. Sylvius. Most certainly, my dear and rev- 
erend abbess, but only wait a moment, we ourselves 
shall soon again see the way clear ; all those venom- 
ous vermin, the dragon seed of satan, who render the 
path to heaven unsafe, must be annihilated. Our 
medical faculty has resolved in secret session to put 
Vesalius out of the way — that arch-heretic and arch- 
enemy of religion and legitimate science. 

Mbess. {Looking heavenwards.) God's blessing 
gained, all gained! 



Prof. Sylvius. Dear Abbess, have you not in 
your convent something like a dungeon, or an old 
well or oistern to cage the demon? It ought to be as 
dark as hell, damp and of a moldy smell, swarming 
with rats and toads. As I said, an old well. 

Sibbess. We have ; but are you going to cage that 
monster in this our fold for pious lambs? 

Prof, Sylvius. Right here, dear Abbess, is the 
right place for that arch-fiend of religion and science ; 
elsewhere the students would discover him and set 
him free ; in no event will they suspect him to be 
here. Those engaged to capture him by night will 
lower him into the well by a rope, into his prospec- 
tive grave, and there he will find congenial company 
in rats, vipers and toads. He will not cause you 
much trouble, as he ought to be given bread and 
water but once a day. Before this is lowered to him 
in a basket, he must be called by name, and the fol- 
lowing question put to him: "Vesalius, you arch- 
fiend of religion and legitimate science, are you 
ready and prepared to renounce what you have 
taught, and willing to burn all your manuscripts?" 

After he has not had a good night's rest for weeks, 
being afraid as soon as he falls asleep the rats will 
gnaw his flesh, and being half starved, then I think 
he will weaken and repent his sins, and will be 
ready to renounce his heresies as regards religion 
and science. Then, dearest Abbess, it will be time 
to send me word. 

Mbess. Monsieur le professeur, would it please 
you to entrust me with the pious mission of daily 
calling upon that arch-fiend of the Holy Church? 

Prof Sylvius. Most certainly! That blessed 



mission could never be placed in more dignified and 
trustworthy hands. Well, now let us send up a 
quiet prayer to implore heaven to help our glorious 
mission. {They offer prayer.) 

Prof. Sylvius. Now, reverend Abbess, let us 
shake hands. Good bye ! 

Mbess. Good bye, monsieur le professeur. ( To 
herself.) I will do my best to gain credit with the 
highest authority of our Holy Church. What a 
glorious mission to bring back an apostate to the 
folds ! I will soon curb and humble that anti-Christ. 
He will have to choose between renouncing and rot- 
ting alive. Yet through zeal for heavenly blessings 
we ought never forget our worldly affairs. 

Now I know who bears the name Anastasia, and I 
will collect my thousand florins in gold. I have 
made them easily. It is the reward that heaven has 
dropped into my lap in advance for the glorious 
missionary work I am going to accomplish upon 
Vesalius. 

{She opens the door of the adjoining room and 
looks in.) 

For heaven's sake, how is this? The golden bird 
is gone, and with him one thousand florins in gold. 
Now I have lost them as fast as I gained them. Or 
was all this but an artifice of Satan? 

(She walks up to one of the windows and looks 
into the street.) 

I declare, there they are, the two birds, Selma and 
Mr. Anselm, giggling and chatting. How is that! 
They seem to be old acquaintances. Oh, if they 
only were in reach of my ear, I think I might hear 
one thing and another of interest to me. Maybe 



Selma is just now disclosing the name Of her mis- 
tress, Anastasia, to Mr. Anselm, causing me to lose 
those beautiful golden florins. Sic transit mundi 
gloria; thus passes away the glory of the world. 
How bold are his manners ! Oh, he knows how to 
manage women ! And how daring are her looks ! All 
that will soon come to a sad end! Look there, now 
those two worldly creatures caress each other. Verily, 
it is difficult to look at them and not feel also some- 
what—eh — ah — somewhat warm and worldly. Well, 
he can well afford to kiss, making by every kiss 
more than a florin in gold, and all the comfort of 
kissing thrown into the bargain ! 

Oh, if I only had those two worldly creatures 
under my management, how humble and devout they 
would grow. And that resurrected creature, Anas- 
tasia, as soon as she is landed here she will certainly 
forget all about resurrection. I will see to that. 
And, in addition, the other sublime mission has 
fallen to my share— to have Vesalius, the arch- 
heretic, under my control ! It seems to me as if all 
those apostates hail from the same nest. Well, I do 
not care to look any longer at those enfants terribles, 
as one grows to feel after a time somewhat worldly, 
remembering bj^gone days. 

Now I will see that a proper place is prepared for 
Anastasia, and for that awful monster, Vesalius. 
Maybe we will succeed in caging those two infidel 
birds there yonder ; then we would have a whole 
bunch of heretics, ad majorem dei gloriam, for the 
greater glory of God. Oh, I will not be slow as soon 
as Vesalius is landed in the old well. They will 
capture him by night at his home, and as soon as the 



arch-fiend, donned in the red hood with red plumes, 
is dumped into the well, I will have my fun. What 
a comfort, what a blessing of the Lord, to have the 
very devil at the bottom of that well, and to have 
that devil under full control ! 



SCENE V. 



Sylvia's Monologue, later Selma, then Professor 
Sylvius, last Vesalius. 

Sylvia. Be still my poor heart, thy struggle will 
soon be o'er. Where may he be, the great and 
enduring hero? With him all the sunshine of my 
soul is gone, and my heart pines like a flower with- 
out light. ODly once more would I listen to hiB 
voice before my poor heart comes to a standstill. 
Why does not grim death mow me down with one 
single stroke of his mighty scythe ! Why does he 
steal so slowly upon my life that flickers as poorly 
as a dying light. The crimson current of my life- 
blood is ebbing cheerlessly through my veins and 
despair is hovering over my soul like a black cloud. 
The flow of his words would instill new life into me 
and all my griefs would come to a sudden end ; for 
the fountain head of my life is not yet languished. 
It is but overwhelmed with grief. Where art thou, 
Vesalius? My heart is longing for you! Oh, how I 
do suffer 1 

(Selma, the maid of Sylvia, enters.) 

Selma. You are brooding again over frightful 
thoughts and the lustre of your eyes has faded away, 
telling of the intense agony of your soul. 



Sylvia. No one shall succeed in burying me alive 
behind the walls of a convent. 

Selma. Take courage, dear Sylvia, I am with you, 
and as long as I have breath no one shall dare harm 
you. 

Sylvia. I know that if I do not allow them to 
bury me alive behind the walls of a convent, they 
will force me into it. 

Selma. You are sick in body and soul, and you 
need the counsel and aid of a physician. 

Sylvia. There is no physician who could alleviate 
my agony. 

Selma. You need more strength; you are too 
weak to take to flight. 

Sylvia. Oh, if I only knew the abode of Vesalius ! 
He is the only one who could give comfort to my 
poor suffering soul. 

Selma. Take the advice of a physician as to what 
you must do to gain strength ; as soon as you have 
strength enough we will set out to find the abode of 
Vesalius. I implore you to get medical advice, 
otherwise they will choose a physician for you and 
then they will take you forcibly to the convent. 

Sylvia. Well, do what you think is best; though 
I know for certain that no physician is able to help 
me. You good soul ought to have the satisfabtion of 
having done everything in your power to comfort me! 

Selma. Oh, how happy you make me ! I will start 
at once and get a physician, who, I believe, is able to 
give you good medical advice. {The bell rings.) 
That is your uncle, Professor Sylvius. Pray tell him 
that you are going to send for a physician. (Prof. 
Sylvius enters.) 



Prof. Sylvius. God bless you, Sylvia. You need 
some blessing badly. The Abbess in the convent of 
the Carmelite nuns has told me that siokness pre- 
vents you from entering the convent this week. 
Well, are you really suffering, or is it solely your 
aim to defer inauguration as much as possible? I 
myself am of the opinion that you ought to make 
a start with the repenting and expunging of your 
sins, as it will take you a long time to expiate your 
sins sufficiently to save you from eternal perdition. I 
shall send for a physician to ascertain that you are 
not suffering bodily, but that your soul has been 
poisoned by the unsound teachings of the heretics. 
No physician is able to cure such poisoning of the 
soul. In such cases only the means of grace of the 
Holy Church are efficient remedies. 

Sylvia. I have already made up my mind to see 
a physician and hear what he has to say about my 
condition. 

Prof. Sylvius. Then please do not forget to tell 
him that you must be improved sufficiently inside 
this week to be able to enter the convent next week, 
where the nuns will continue the treatment. They 
understand much better curing the souls of the 
wicked, and the Abbess has no equal in treating 
with the best results people who are suffering from 
irreligious notions. Therefore you ought to hurry 
and enter that sanitarium for heretics as soon as 
possible. 

Sylvia. I shall never enter a convent. 

Prof. Sylvius. In such a case we shall be com- 
pelled to have you taken there by force. 

Sylvia. I prefer death to entering a convent. 



Trof. Sylvius. I do not wonder that you prefer 
eternal perdition to the salvation of your heretical 
soul, but we will save you from eternal perdition 
without your consent. You will soon hear from me. 
God bless you. (He departs. Selma enters^) 

Selma. Now it is high time for you to see a 
physician. 

Sylvia. In my case all medical skill is in vain. 

Selma. Perhaps it is not. 

Sylvia. Well, I will agree to see a physician to 
afford your heart every chance of comforting me. 

{Selma exit) 

Sylvia. I am doomed. My fate will have its ful- 
filment ; there is no escape. I know that I am 
already a captive, though they try to conceal the fact. 
My uncle is as fanatical and merciless as my father. 
There is but one who could extrioate me from my 
perilous situation, but no one knows of his where- 
abouts. Oh, worse than that, nobody knows whether 
he is still among the living. Vesalius ! Vesalius ! 
The agony of my soul is unbearable. If I knew that 
you were gone — you, who owns my soul and in whom 
my whole existence centers, I should not hesitate for 
one moment to throw away my miserable existence, 
like a useless and unbearable burden, and follow you 
into death. My wounds are fatal^ no physician is 
able to make them heal. ( The hell rings and Selma 
enters.) 

Selma. The physician has arrived. Has he per- 
mission to walk in? 

Sylvia Let me have a moment's time to collect 
myself. I think I had better not see the physician. 

Selma. You make me unhappy. 



Sylvia. (Determined.) If such be the case, let 
him walk in. ( Vesalius enters.) 

Sylvia. Vesalius ! dear Vesalius ! 

Yes. {Embracing Sylvia.) My own dear Sylvia! 

Sylvia. Oh, how much better I feel already! 
You are the only physician able to give me relief. 

Yes. Thou sweet star, no one but you could com- 
fort my soul, suffering with fatal agony. Already 
new life pulses through my veins. 

Sylvia. When we parted from each other at Lou- 
vaine your life was endangered every hour, and my 
father had made preparations to imprison me in a 
convent. Up till now my uncle, Professor Sylvius, 
has not succeeded in burying me alive within the 
walls of a convent, but they are just about to take 
me there by force ; here, in the very last moment, 
you, my friend Vesalius, appear as my liberator. 

Yes. What do you say? Professor Sylvius is 
your uncle? Well, take courage, Sylvia. That per- 
fidious fanatic shall not succeed in imprisoning you 
for life in a convent nor in throwing me into the old 
cistern at the convent. 

Sylvia. What is the matter, Vesalius ! You make 
me tremble. Are they again plotting against your life? 

Yes. It is your uncle, Prof. Sylvius, who in his 
religious frenzy tries to imprison you in the cell of a 
convent, and it is he, who, as an orthodox and 
fanatical believer in the old anatomical school of 
Galenus, tries to have me thrown into an old well to 
compel me to renounce my teachings, or, at any rate, 
to put me out of his way. 

Sylvia. And you think we shall be able to escape 
our awful fate? 



Yes. Only by betakiug ourselves to speedy flight 
may we make good our escape. 

Sylvia. There is no escape for me from this 
house, as I am strictly watched. 

Yes. Then you will have to leave it in the guise 
of death. 

Sylvia. Oh, if there be still a hope of rescue! 

Yes. The only way is that you allow me to have 
you buried alive. 

Sylvia. It seems everybody is bent upon burying 
me alive, even you, dear friend Vesalius. 

Yes. {^Placing his hands on her shoulders.) It 
is but for a short time. After that, Anastasia will 
resurrect forever and go with me to Switzerland. 
By night I am not safe for a moment, and may ex- 
pect at any time to be surprised and made a prisoner. 
By day they do not dare harm me, as the majority of 
the students are on my side and would prevent any 
violence. Dear Anselm insists upon exchanging our 
hoods, to mislead the mob hired by our enemies, but 
thus it might happen that instead of me he may be 
captured. 

Here, dear Sylvia, is a vial, the contents of which 
will be sufficient to put you in a state of apparent 
death. They will think that in your state of de- 
spondency you have with your own hands put an end 
to your sufferings, but your uncle has enough prom- 
inence and authority to make the people believe that 
paralysis of the heart has caused your death. He 
has reasons for making it appear that way in order 
to avoid the disgrace a case of suicide would bring 
upon his family, and in order to secure for you a 
decent burial in consecrated ground in the sepulchre 



of his family. Down there, dear Sylvia, in the late 
hours of the night, I shall revive you. Anselm and 
Selma know all about it, and will do all they can to 
make our plan a success. As soon as you are re- 
vived, we will, right from the tomb, direct our steps 
towards Switzerland. Do not forget that when I 
come to relieve the fetters with which your nerves 
have been bound by the grim poison imported from 
the newly discovered world, the word that will free 
you will be "Anastasia." In this way we whisper 
the name of one who is asleep into his ear to awaken 
him gently. I shall whisper this word into your 
ear, as there is no other way to remove the spell by 
which your vitality is bound, as the awakening must 
start from the centers of life of the one who is in 
such a trance. 

Sylvia. And if I should not hear you call and 
not wake up again? 

Yes. For heaven's sake do not speak such fearful 
words, each of them paralyzes every thought of mine 
and brings my brain near to madness. 

Sylvia. Do not be afraid, Vesalius. Even then, 
should I not awake, I am thine. Dead and alive. 
My trance, I presume, would not last very long, and 
then eternal slumber would overwhelm me. Without 
hesitation and without fear I shall empty the con- 
tents of this vial, and, as you tell me, all power to 
move my limbs or any muscle will be lost while my 
consciousness will remain. Then I shall be conscious 
of being buried alive in that tomb and of resting 
between the defunct members of the Sylvius family, 
and under the influence of that dismal draught, until 
you, my liberator, appear to awaken me. You must 



not forget the word that relieves my Bpell-bound 
condition, for I am not yet prepared to sleep forever, 
as I have to assist you, and wish to admire your 
future magnificent career, when the rising star of 
your life will speed along like a glariDg and brilliant 
comet in its extraordinary and wonderful path. In- 
deed, I wish to witness your splendid victory in time 
to come ; and it is hard for me to be buried alive at 
the very moment we have just been united. 

My kindest regards to our good and true friend, 
Anselm. I am confident it is his generous and un- 
tiring care to which I owe the fact that I have found 
you again. 

(Selma appears, giving a sign of warning. 
Vesalius embraces Sylvia and leaves.) 



SCENE VI. 



Family Sepulchre of Trofessor Sylvius— Sylvia in 
an Open Coffin — Vesalius. 

( Vesalius entering the vault.) 

Ves. Now, dear Sylvia, I am coming to remove 
the bonds with which that awful draught has chained 
your vitality. Wake up dear Sylvia and let us take 
to flight. I see you cannot yet arouse yourself. All 
thy nervous strength has become exhausted by the 
awful mental agony thou hast suffered. 

Well, rest a little longer. Oh, what a blissful sen- 
sation to doze in half consciousness, when the re- 
membrance of all that we have suffered vanishes ! 
Floating on the ethereal sea of dreamy consciousness, 



hazy phantoms flit about us and any messages from 
the outside world, urging admission at the gates of 
our mind, dissolve into an accord of the sweetest 
harmony, into a blissful trance. 

Dear Sylvia, do not hurry to return to the rough, 
realistic world ! Do rest thyself a little more, dear 
comrade, who has stood devotedly on my side in all 
those days of affliction ! Rest and comfort thy tor- 
tured soul, for I hope the time will soon come when 
I shall be able to comfort you. 

How slowly her chest is heaving, at such long in- 
tervals, as if life were ebbing away ! How is this ! 
Suddenly a sensation of deadly fear is creeping over 
me, lest that crimson current of blood that courses 
through her veins may suddenly stop and that won- 
derful heart come to a standstill, and — standstill — 
means — death! Death! I say. The mere thought 
of it benights my mind. 

No, Sylvia, thou canst not die without taking me 
unto death. Pale like death is thy face, white as 
marble are thy hands ! Oh, dear Sylvia, speak but 
a single word to me to end my agony ! Are thy 
hands so cold as they look? I dare not touch them, 
as a sudden touch might shock your worn out nerves 
and throw out of gear the delicate mechanism of thy 
soul. How is it that such a frightful feeling steals, 
over and over again, upon my agonized mind! 

Look! her chest does not heave any longer! 
Sylvia, dear Sylvia, wake up ! Open thy eyes and 
let those bright stars light the darkness that creeps 
into my soul! {Louder.) Sylvia, dear Sylvia, 
wake up! (Taking hold of one of her hands.) 
How cold, how lifeless, no throbs of life ! What 



have I done! Have I killed her ! My mind be- 
comes confused, my memory a blank ! What word 
was I to utter to break the spell with which the fatal 
draught has bound her? Only through the ear can 
the saving word reach her mind. There is no other 
means to revive the life that has been smothered by 
the venom of the Indian arrow poison. And when I 
stop to think that this devilish drug paralyzes only 
the movements of the muscles, while consciousness 
fully remains, I shudder at the thought that she 
whom I love above all others hears every word I 
utter and suffers with me all my unspeakable agony, 
my untold misery, and is waiting in vain for the 
redeeming word ! 

My soul is imbued with darkness, and the demon 
of wildest despair takes hold of me, whispering into 
my ear : 

"Thou hast poisoned the queen of thy own heart!" 

Oh, Sylvia, if there is one spark of life left within 
thee, let me die ! It is I who deserves hundred fold, 
thousand fold death ! Let me kiss death from your 
lips, Anastasia! 

{He kisses her, Sylvia opens her eyes and 
stretches lovingly her arms unto Vesalius.) 

Sylvia. At last you have uttered the word 
"Anastasia," unbinding the spell! How invigorated 
I feel! How happy I am ! What a delight it is to 
me to have been restored to you ! What a blessing 
to be once more united with you, Vesalius. 

{She descends from the coffin and holds out her 
arms towards Vesalius, who embraces and kisses 
her. M the same moment the cry of a screech-owl 
is heard?) 



Yes. The cry of an owl ; friend Anselm is coming. 
I hope without a dismal owl-message. (plnselm 
enters.) 

Sins. Master Vesalius, I am glad that the resur- 
rection has been a success, for it is high time to 
start for Switzerland. I have just learned that at 
daybreak the workingmen will be here to seal the 
coffin. They are going to solder the lid, and that 
would have made resurrection a rather difficult un- 
dertaking. Approaching Sylvia.) Good morning, 
I trust that you have had a good rest and a happy 
resurrection! How to die is soon learned, without 
any aid or skill, but the re-awakening needs the 
master hand of Master Vesalius. 

Sylvia. Dear friend Anselm, you are always 
ready and prepared for a joke; even at a time of 
affliction, and in the tomb. 

Sins. That stands to reason, for I have abided 
more in tombs and underground, more with the 
dead than with the living. (Pointing to Vie coffin?) 
I would like to lie down in such a chest and take a 
good rest, but the church charges such a big rent 
for such a small house, and will not even tell us how 
long we will be allowed to sleep there before the 
bugle of the last judgment day toots us up. ( Turn- 
ing lo Vesalius.) Master Vesalius, I warn you not 
to go back to your residence, as the myrmidons of 
the medical priestcraft are after you, trying to cap- 
ture you and take you to the convent of the Car- 
melite nuns. There they would have you find out 
the depth of the well in the yard of the convent. 
There at the bottom of the cistern you would at any 
rate be somewhat nearer the purgatory, while from 



above, the devil's grandmother, the abbess, stand- 
ing at the opening of the well, would raise hell for you 
by her endeavors to convert you. 

You had better start right here for Switzerland, 
and it will be a good plan if you hand me over your 
red hood with the blue feather. Do not trouble 
about your manuscripts. I will pack them up most 
carefully and take good care of them. Now, good bye, 
Master Vesalius, till we meet again in Switzerland. 
( Turning to Sylvia.) I wish you good speed, An- 
astasia. Shall I tell the abbess at the nunnery of 
the Carmelite nuns that you thankfully decline her 
motherly care and her endeavors to save you from 
eternal perdition, and that Master Vesalius does not 
show any inclination to take up his quarters at the 
bottom of the well? 

Vesalius and Sylvia. Good bye, dear friend An- 
selm, and au revoir in Switzerland. {They leave.) 

Sins. Well, now I must straighten up the resur- 
rection stage. First thing I must put this lid on the 
coffin, lest the working men see that the bird has 
left her nest and the cage is empty. (He has a 
hard job lo lift the heavy coffin lid and close the 
coffin.) Such a heavy metal lid makes the resur- 
rection business rather a hard job; such a coffin is 
expensive, and thus it costs nearly as much to get 
into purgatory as it costs to get out of it. The 
wreaths I will replace on top of the coffin ; the more 
empty a shrine the more ornamental the parapher- 
nalia should be. How many wreaths of sterling 
gold and silver men place before the holy of the 
holiest as a dedication to the unknown ! It is con- 
sidered to be a capital sin to enter the holy of the 



holiest, and the sacreligious intruder is put to death, 
lest he may tell the outsiders that there is nothing 
in the holy of the holiest. 

The secret mongers, decorated with gold and tawdry, 
make the crowd gape, hope and believe, and then it 
is time to fleece the flock. Unsound doctrines are 
clothed in a solemn garb and paraded with pomp 
and great ostentation, until they appear to be pro- 
found truth. A thick, sticky and sweet paste ap- 
plied to the minds of the crowd draws blisters on the 
brains of the credulous and gives one full sway over 
their minds. 

Here is the wreath given by the abbess ; she is 
now in deep and genuine mourning, for she has 
lost, first of all, one thousand florins of gold, and, 
in addition, a lady and gentleman victim, both of 
whom she was going to torture and convert. Anas- 
tasia and Vesalius have escaped her blessed moth- 
erly love. This is the flower token of the old grinny, 
skinny, sheep-skin Professor Sylvius, who is now in 
a dilemma because his time is over for constantly 
rehashing his stale anatomical pap as regards the 
anatomy of dogs and monkeys and serving it to his 
medical students as the genuine article of scientific 
nectar and ambrosia. He has met his master in 
Vesalius, and in his attempt to dump Master Vesal- 
ius into that old cistern he has struck a snag in Mr. 
Anselm. 

And here is the wreath dedicated by Selma, my 
little sweetheart. Her wreath comes from a pure 
and good heart, and it does her, and me also, much 
credit, for we have cured our two patients, Anastasia 
and Vesalius, of their great grief. 



Oh, as soon as I meet my sweetheart again, in 
Switzerland, I must tell her how much I have to tell 
her even although I have forgotten nearly all about 
it. Still I will remember that she is my honey. I 
will twist a knot in my handkerchief lest I forget to 
tell her how much I love her. As soon as Master 
Veealius is to have the sailor's knot tied, I will do 
likewise if I do not forget it. (He pulls his hand- 
kerchief y twisted into many knots, out of his 
pocket) Half a dozen knots are already here and 
I do not know what a single one has been made to 
remind me of. 

But now I will hurry and pack up Master Vesal- 
ius' manuscripts, and secure them, and then I will 
slip into his bed in order that the hirelings may at 
least find the would-be Vesalius to take him to the 
convent. 

At any rate I must be captured, and very likely 
more or less killed, in order that Master Vesalius 
and Anastasia may gain a good start in their escape 
to Switzerland. But now it strikes me that I cannot 
afford to be killed, for I not only have to pack up 
and secure the manuscripts of Master Vesalius, but 
I have to hand them over to him. 

Hem! they might kill me, even although I cannot 
well afford it ! By Jove 1 now I have got it. If they 
crowd on me and show too great fondness for killing 
me, then I will throw my bag containing half a 
bushel of letters of indulgence among the mob, and, 
while they exchange fisticuffs and black-eye each 
other, I may be able to make good my escape. 

At the time I bought those letters of indulgence at 
Cologne from Tetzel the idea struck me that it was 



a good plan to have at all times some indulgences in 
stock. What a motherly care the holy church takes 
of her black and scabby sheep! Alas! there is a 
hitch in the business. If one of the mob happens to 
catch a letter of indulgence for murder, then he will 
kill me outright, because he has the privilege, hold- 
ing a letter of indulgence in his hands. And the 
others? They will kill me without a privilege. I 
think that means too much being killed at one time. 

I think I shall have to behave like a man who is 
going to be killed with or without a privilege. It 
won't take me long to get into that well, and down 
to the bottom of it ; but how my anatomy will fare, 
that is another question ! If my frame does not drop 
to pieces I think for a while I shall be well off at 
the bottom of that old cistern, and have a calling 
acquaintance with the rats and toads that are swarm- 
ing there, and meanwhile Master Vesalius will get a 
good start. And while there I shall have leisure to 
think about how to again get out. 

As a matter of course I shall show no fight in order 
to land at least only half dead at the bottom of the 
well. There I am safer than anywhere else. 

But for heaven's sake, I must hurry; otherwise I 
shall miss one of the very best opportunities of get- 
ting killed. {He goes.) 



SCENE VII. 

Yard of the Convent of the Carmelite Nuns by 
Night finselm, a Mot), Dominican Monk. 

( Wild and confused clamour is heard and grad- 
ually grows more distinctly audible, a mob with 
torches appears and in their midst is XLnselm, 
donned with a red hood and feathers of the same 
color, and a rope around his neck.) 

One of the Mob. Now we have got that gallow 
bird and we will cage him in that cistern. Let us 
lower him down to the bottom of the well. 

Another One. No ceremonies with a heretic ! 
Kick him down ! 

The First. No, that won't do ; we have got the 
order and are paid for it to deliver the man alive at 
the place of his destination. Take the shackles from 
his hands and stop choking him ! Let him take a 
breath ! 

.tins. (Taking a good breath.) "We have got 
him," you bandits ! Who have you got ; did you 
really get the right man? No, you did not. Are 
you not ashamed of yourselves for not having rightly 
done the job for which you were hired and paid? I 
am not the man you were ordered to catch. You 
have got the wrong man ! 

One of the Gang. You are the right man. You 
wear a red hood with red feathers and we have 
dragged you out of bed in the very house that was 
pointed out to us. 

Pins. But I am not Vesalius, for whom you went. 



My name is Anselm. Here it is engraved on the 
metal plate of my belt. 

The Former Speaker of the Gang. {Looking al 
the plate. Proudly.) I am able to read. The man 
is right. His name is Anselm. He is not Vesalius, 
for whom we were sent out. I think it best to let 
him go. 

(M thai moment the (Dominican monk rushes up, 
wildly gesticulating.) 

Monk. What the hell do you say? Let him go! 
I say dump him down into the well. 

He is one of the worst heretics, 

An investigator and a violator of religion. 

He complains of the yoke imposed by the church ; 

Down with him to the bottom of the well, 

The deeper and darker so much the better ! 

Down there among the rats and toads, 

Tortured the while by physical and mental agony, 

And unable to be reached by the hand of a friend, 

His stubborn mind will soon soften. 

Don't hesitate, don't shrink back, 

Take hold of him, collar him ; 

He has been caught with his red hood on. 

Birds of the same feather are nocking together. 

The saying goes, as regards to such rogues, 

They went together and were caught and will be hanged 

together. 
Put the rope 'round his neck 
And swing the hell-hound down into the pit. 

{They seize vlnselm and put him in the basket 
that is suspended from a rope fastened al the 
gallow-shaped beam over the opening of the well.) 

tins. (Standing in the basket, turning toward 
the monk.) 



You damned hell-hound, 

You are bound for the pit ! 

God himself must hold his sides with laughing, 

Seeing how you priests command and wink at 

Selling indulgence of murder and arson, 

And calling yourselves servants of God. 

To keep your fat belly together, 

Stuffed out with roast meat, hot and cold, 

You wear a rope around your gizzard ; 

Without that rope I bet five pennies 

All your stuffing would burst and go to the devil. 

What is your doing? To gluttonize and to tipple, 

To wave the beggar's bag and peddle indulgence. 

A rope around your neck would suit you 

And be at the same time for me a rare treat. 

You are a damned, begging friar, 

An infamous spy and a tool of the Inquisition. 

All you do is fraud and imposition. 

The Dominican monk, Torquemada, 

Has heaped ridicule and everlasting infamy upon your order, 

By sketching the statutes of the Inquisition. 

You are murdering and disgracing the human mind. 

The Monk. Down! down with him to hell!! 
{tinselm is lei down to the bottom of the well) 
Now let us catch the other bird with the blue hood 
and the blue feathers. 

( 7 lie crowd, including the (Dominican friar, leave 
Vie yard of the convent, then the loud hallooing 
voice of Jinselm is heard from Vie bottom of the 
well. ) 

Sins. Help! Murder! 

(^ nun rushes up lo the opening of the well.) 

'Nun. Hello ! You must keep still down there, 
and are not allowed to speak until you are asked. 

sins. Why don't you ask me? 



Nun* If you do not keep very quiet, I'll let the 
water into the well until you are standing in the 
water up to your neck. 

Ans. Holy sister, perform no ceremonies. I do 
not need a bath, nor any refreshment. But I am 
longing for the reverend abbess. Please tell her 
that I am not Vesalius, but the one-thousand-gold- 
florin man. 

Nun. I will call the abbess. 

(Pause, then ihe abbess appears and calls down 
into the well.) Vesalius, you heretic anddespiser of 
the holy church and of science, are you ready to re- 
nounce all that you have taught and burn all your 
scriptures? 

$Lns. Bless the Lord! I am not Vesalius ; I am 
the one-thousand-gold-florin man. You have thrown 
one thousand florins in gold into the well. Please 
order that I may be pulled up as quickly as possible, 
mater reverendissima. 

ttbbess. {Turning to Ihe nun.) Call for assist- 
ance. ( The nun rings a bell and half a dozen nuns 
appear.) Do pull that man up out of the well. He 
does not deserve to be down there. 

{The nuns lower Ihe basket which is fastened to 
the rope, and start to pull slnselm up, who as soon 
as he gels sight of ihe nuns says:) "Well done, you 
are performing a work that will please the Lord, 
because you are pulling up the one-thousand-gold- 
florin man. Ah, there you are, my dear abbess ! I 
suppose you remember that I offered to pay you one 
thousand florins in gold as a reward provided you 
could tell me the abode of Mis3 Anastasia?" {Mean- 
while ttnselm swings himself to ihe floor of ihe 



yard.) Well, now I am standing on terra firma and 
we'll soon cut down my transactions to a fine point. 

Pibbess. Now I am able to tell you the abode of 
Anastasia. 

pins. What a pity that I know that Anastasia is 
living at the residence of her uncle and guardian, 
Professor Sylvius. 

Pibbess. Then my thousand florins in gold are 
still in the well. 

Pins. But / am not there any more. But say, 
dear Abbess, I met a most peculiar set of company 
in the well. 

pibbess. Very likely the company of rats and 
toads. 

pins. Plenty of them ! but also a good many baby 
skeletons, and all of them the size of a new born 
babe. 

Pibbess. How did they get there! That's a trick 
of the devil. 

pins. The devil is quite innocent of that! Those 
poor creatures were not born there, but were made 
angels. Perhaps that well is the dumping ground 
for the babies born in this nunnery? 

pibbess. Sacre de bleu, voila le salan! (She be- 
crosses herself.) 

pins. Maybe so, but I am innocent of those baby 
skeletons. 

Plbbess. Now you will have to wait here until I 
send for monsieur le professeur Sylvius, who has 
made it a point to pass upon such affairs. 

Pins. Professor Sylvius is an expert on the bones 
of dogs and monkeys, but he does not understand 
anything about human bones. 



Mbess. At any rate Professor Sylvius will have 
to decide what shall become of your anatomy. 

fins. Oh, I remember. It was he who ordered 
Master Vesalius to be thrown into the well and told 
you to take him under your blessed care. But I 
have no time to wait here longer. I have told the 
medical students that either Vesalius or I would be 
captured and taken to your convent and dumped into 
the well. The students will soon be here, lots of 
them, and they will have to decide the matter. Dear 
Abbess, remember the iconoclasts at Ghent ; if you 
try to interfere with my personal liberty they will 
set the red hood on the roof of your convent and 
burn down this devil's nest. 

JLbbess. (Becrossing herself.) Sister doorkeeper, 
open the gate and let this devil out as quickly as 
possible. 

tins. (Doffing his hood.) Thank you, my dear 
lady. Good-bye ! 



ACT III. 

SCENE I. 

Scene on the Border of the River Rhine Move 

Basel in Switzerland. Vesalius, 

later Anselm. 

Yes* What a heavenly comfort ! Up till now I 
have been weighed down by the oppressive atmos- 
phere of the grave vault ; here I indulge in an in- 
vigorating air I have never breathed before. It flows 
from the summits of a free country — mountains 
towering into the heavens. My eyes, tired and worn 
by the light of a smoldering and flickering candle, 
enjoy now the glorious sunlight. How its beams 
dash through the air and animate mind and body ! 
And there yonder are the emerald waters of the 
Rhine, clear like crystal, and, high above me, much 
higher than in my native country, arches the dome 
of the holy temple of nature. 

Emerging from the dismal vaults of the grave- 
yard, where for years and years I carried on my 
anatomical researches, I am now favored at merely 
looking to the lofty azure vault of the skies. There, 
was the dim and unsteady light of the tallow-dip ; 
here, the brilliant orb sends its beaming and life- 
giving shafts into my very soul, which has been and 
always will be longing for light. Indeed, I am com- 
forted as I have never been comforted before. Here, 
I glory in the pure air, in the heavenly light, and 
drink, in large draughts, the sweetest and most 
powerful elixir of life - liberty ! 

9/ 



In my ill-fated native country, the Netherlands, 
the fields are devastated, the crops trampled under 
foot like weeds by the armies of the most Christian 
emperor, Charles V. 

Christians are fighting Christians and both parties 
offer up prayers to the all-good Lord to assist them 
in their mutual butcheries. What a blasphemy ! 
The earth is steaming with the life-blood of men 
fighting for the glory of the Lord, and the soil smells 
with murder. Here I am greeted with orchards, 
plentiful with fruit, by luxuriant crops, by the en- 
chanting verdure of the vineyards, and by the fra- 
grauce of sunny meadows. 

There the thunder of the howitzers and the rum- 
bling of musketry is heard, and the field snakes and 
other hellish machines belch and bellow; while here 
in this benighted land but the roar and thunder of 
thunderstorms and mighty waterfalls is heard. 
There, spies and sycophants are rampant; here I 
meet everywhere men bold and straightforward. 
There I consorted with bats and toads; here the 
eagle soars in lofty and sunny heights, and fleety 
chamois dare any danger for freedom's sake. 

Here it is delightful to live, here I would like to 
make my abode. How heart and soul expand in 
such surroundings ! 

The foundation stone of my career is laid, my 
auditorium is crowded with students of every age, 
with youths and with men in office and high posi- 
tions, my reputation is spreading fast and soon my 
anatomical plates, the result of untiring investiga- 
tion, will be published. 

The high schools and universities of Switzerland 



Bend forth enlightenment into those countries where 
the people are still languishing in disgraceful religi- 
ous bondage. Zwingli, the reformatory beacon light 
of Zwitzerland, and Luther, the reformatory fire- 
brand there yonder in Germany, aided by the mag- 
nificent scholar, Melanchthon, shake the time-hon- 
ored foundations of the Church, (ttnselm enters.) 

Ans. I greet you with all my heart, Master 
Vesalius. I have just arrived at Basel, coming from 
Paris, and I was told that you had gone out for a 
nice walk along the bank of the Rhine. 

Yes. My hearty welcome to you, friend Anselm. 
How glad I am to see you again ! 

tins. I am rather late, as I had some business 
transactions in a well at Paris. 

Yes. How is that, friend Anselm? 

Arts. As I had anticipated, they were after you, 
Master Vesalius. The same night you left for 
Switzerland, soon after midnight, when I had hardly 
finished carefully packing up and securing your 
manuscripts, there was a knock at the door of your 
home where I had taken quarters. Ere I found time 
to say "Come in," the door was smashed to pieces 
and the hirelings came in. There was not much 
ceremony, they pulled me out of bed, shoved your 
purple velvet hood with the red feather, which I had 
exchanged with you for my red hood, on my head 
and put a neat piece of rope around my neck. I 
think I looked rather funny, though dressed in the 
latest Parisian faphion. Donned in a purple velvet 
hood, adorned with nodding feathers, and enshrouded 
in my night-gown, barefooted and around my neck a 
solid piece of neckwear made of hemp, I was made 



to strut along to the convent of the Carmelite nuns. 
I think that guyrope was to prevent me from missing 
my way; and all this was meant for you, Master 
Vesalius, for the purple velvet hood and the red 
feather made them believe that they had caught the 
right bird. My hempen Decktie did not allow me to 
cut any capers, because as soon as I tried to walk as 
I liked the neckwear would get very tight and I my- 
self become short-winded. 

As soon as they had landed me at the opening of 
the cistern, and were about to inaugurate me as a 
Cisterniense friar, I showed them the plate of my 
belt, with my name engraved thereon, telling them 
that they had caught the wrong man. They were 
just about to let me go, when that wicked old begging 
friar from Louvaine jumped out of the crowd, like a 
wounded bear, and denounced me as a heretic. Now, 
of course, I went down to the bottom of the cistern 
without any stopovers. How I got out of that well 
again, and out of that nunnery, I will tell you at an- 
other time. I think here in Switzerland we are at 
the right place ; a great number of students at Paris 
will come to Basel to attend your lectures on 
anatomy. At Louvaine, that hotbed of priestcraft, 
the number of students is dwindling. The noble- 
men in the Netherlands are going to the highschools 
and universities of Switzerland, from whence they 
import a good many new religious notions into their 
native country. The same is the case with the mer- 
chants and traveling tradesmen devoted to the new 
gospel ; they gather at the great emporiums of com- 
merce, at Antwerp and Amsterdam, and the large 
number of Swiss and German mercenary troops, 



which the emperor, Charles V, is constantly amass- 
ing in the Netherlands, carry another lot of heresy 
there. And how many refugees from Germany, 
France and England emigrate to the Netherlands ! 
They leave their native countries to enjoy the free 
constitution of Flandern and Brabant, and the won- 
derful invention of the art of printing does the rest. 

Especially in Flandern is industry and hustle and 
bustle considered to be a virtue. Therefore, not 
only the order of the begging friars, but also any 
order leading an idle life, as all the friars do, is 
rather disliked. In this respect the new heretioal 
creed, which sets the people against popery and the 
idleness of the religious orders, is favored by the 
crowd. 

Yes. Indeed the number of people converted to 
the new creed is considerable, especially in the 
Northern provinces, but the new gospel is more ex- 
tensively met with among the foreigners gathering 
at Brussels and at Antwerp than among the people 
of the Netherlands. 

Sins. But the number of leaflets of the most 
bitter satire increases every day, and there are plenty 
of itinerary bands of orators who expose the short- 
comings of the church in songs and theatrical farces, 
thus lowering the authority of the church and pre- 
paring the soil for the new tenets. 

Yes. But we should never forget that the em- 
peror, Charles V, has not been educated by priests 
but by gentlemen like Croy and Chievre ; the em- 
peror prefers tournaments and knightly tilts to re- 
ligious exercises of penitence. As a rule he must of 
course take the part of the church and try to hem in 



the tide of the reform movement by the most power- 
ful means and measures. Unfortunately the power 
is with the enemies of the new gospel. 

Small wonder that after the church has domineered 
over and enthralled the human mind for centuries 
the tidal wave for free thought breaks through all 
dikes and embankments, and, overflowing its natural 
channel, endangers the legitimate rights of the rulers 
and destroys time-honored institutions. 

The booklets and leaflets spread broadcast through 
Europe not only teach the truth but at the same 
time foster fanaticism, forcing our good cause into 
the channels of rebellion. 

Sins. One cannot bring about a thorough change 
of the rottenness of the church by means of kid 
gloves. The more violent the means supplied by the 
emperor, or any other ruling power, the more the im- 
petuosity of the mighty current of the new thought 
increases, as such a current has an elementary 
power. Wise concessions of the emperor, granting 
more freedom of thought and belief, would regulate 
the impetuosity of that powerful current. 

Yes. Luther denies indulgence and worship of 
the saints, but any criminal that breaks into a 
church or convent and steals the sacred vessels from 
the altar is called a Lutheran. Small wonder that a 
party that is constantly represented to the emperor 
as subversive is prosecuted and threatened with 
annihilation, for the church is always the principal 
support of every ruler. 

pins. But to the country there yonder, to Ger- 
many, the emperor has granted a good deal of religi- 
ous liberty, and why does he not do the same with 



our native country, the Netherlands? There, over 
the Rhine, in Germany, the emperor has made liberal 
concessions as regards the new creed ; for the Ger- 
man princes resisted any kind of reprisals ; but, at 
the same time, in the Netherlands, in Brabant as 
well as in Flandern, the emperor persecutes the new 
gospel by the most cruel edicts. In the last edict he 
forbids the people to read the Evangelists and the 
Apostles; in addition he forbids all public and 
secret meetings and all conversation at home, even 
at dinner, relating to religion. In all the provinces 
of the Netherlands tribunals have been established 
to see that those edicts are strictly observed. Any 
one who harbors an opinion favoring the new creed 
loses his position or degree, and he who has been 
proved guilty of having spread heresy, or having at- 
tended a meeting of heretics, is condemned to death, 
male heretics being beheaded and women buried 
alive, while refractory heretics are put at the stake. 
Even the recanting of the heretic does not save his 
life, the death sentence being irrevocable ; he who 
foreswears his new creed gets the mere advantage of 
being put to death u in a milder way.' 1 

I am of the opinion that the emperor is a cunning 
rascal and perhaps a Jesuit. Contrary to law all 
that the delinquent possec-ses is confiscated by the 
government. And is it not a most precious law that 
a citizen of Holland shall not be indicted by a court 
outside of a province within which the accused is 
born, yet they take him outside the limits of his 
birthplace and have him sentenced by an outlandish 
tribunal. 

It is the church that guides the arm of the hang- 



man, and what is considered a time-honored law by 
the secular courts is trampled upon by the despotism 
of the church. 

It is true that the emperor manages in Germany 
religious affairs in a more considerate way, but it 
is equally true that his military success in Germany 
has made him bold enough to introduce the Spanish 
Inquisition into the Netherlands. 

Yes. You mean the ecclesiastical tribunals? 

tins. Oh, that name is nothing but a disguise, 
because Antwerp became alarmed by the mere word, 
"Inquisition," to such a degree that all the commerce 
of that great emporium came to a standstill, the 
richest and most prominent merchants made up 
their minds to leave the city, real estate became de- 
preciated and commercial transactions were reduced 
to such a degree that financial ruin stared into the 
face of her inhabitants, causing the big current of 
gold that flowed from Antwerp into the emperor's 
coffers to shrink considerably. 

This fact caused the emperor to follow the advice 
of the governor Margareth and to give orders to the 
Blood-Tribunal to be more lenient with foreign mer- 
chants and to act under the name of ecclesiastical 
courts and not under the name of the Inquisition, 
but in the provinces the Blood-Tribunals, as they 
are called by the people, act under the genuine 
name, and, indeed, with unheard of despotism and 
the most fanatical cruelty, more than thirty thousand 
persons having already fallen victims. 

Yes. That is true, but the other party has raised 
the question who it is that has made the commerce 
of the Netherlands as great as it is at the present 



time. They say it is the wonderful strength and 
power of Charles V.'s government that overawes all 
other nations, that has opened all harbors to the 
merchant ships of the Netherlands, and that has 
procured the most favorable commercial treaties for 
her with all nations. For that reason the commer- 
cial power of the Hansa has been broken down, and 
all countries are ruled by this mighty monarch. Spain 
and Germany and Italy and the New World and the 
East Indies have been opened to the commerce of 
the Netherlands. 

The emperor has united Burgundy and six prov- 
inces with the Netherlands, and thereby has placed 
the latter in the same rank with the other European 
powers, thus flattering the national pride and at the 
same time putting an end to the everlasting war- 
fare between the provinces, which had been for so 
many years a great drawback to commercial success. 
Now they enjoy undisturbed the fruits of peaceful 
commerce and consider the emperor their benefactor. 
The glory of his many victories, the splendor of his 
unlimited power, suggests his invincibleness ; he 
who has been victorious in Germany, France, Italy, 
Africa and in the East and West Indies ! Ail nations 
admire him, and you know that a ruler who is ad- 
mired may allow himself a great deal. 

In addition we should not forget that the emperor, 
Charles V, was born and raised in the Netherlands ; 
he speaks the tongue of that country; he likes the 
manners and customs of the Netherlandish people. 
He likes their genuine ways of sociability, as they 
afford him relaxation after suffering under the bur- 
den and strain of Spanish etiquette, that has estab- 



lished a barrier between the people and its ruler, 
and which is jealously upheld. At Madrid, grave 
and haughty courtiers block the way of the people 
who try to get admission to their sovereign, but not 
so at Brussels. In the Netherlands the emperor 
speaks the same tongue as the people, he is amiable, 
he regulates his private life according to the customs 
of the country and keeps up a pleasant and obliging 
conversation, thus making plenty of friends and ad- 
mirers among the people. 

Sins. Nothing but jugglery! While he is per- 
forming these diplomatic tricks his armies trample 
down the crops of the country and his greedy hands 
are reaching out to grasp all the gold treasured by 
the commercial activity of our people at Antwerp, at 
Brussels and at Ghent, with which to pay the spies 
he has in every civilized country at the courts of the 
sovereigns and elsewhere. 

For that very reason we are not safe here from the 
bloodhounds of the Inquisition ; not even here. 

Yes. Do you not think, friend Anselm, that you 
sometimes see phantoms? 

tins. Phantoms, Master Vesalius? The spies of 
the Inquisition are romping everywhere. 

Yes. But there are no spies to be found in these 
delightfully lonely surroundings! 

Sins. Why not? Just now I heard a suspicious 
noise in the water. 

Yes. Maybe a fish or a frog? 

sins. {Stepping near the water 'sedge.) Here is 
an oar floating in the water, where is the skiff it be- 
longs to, and where is the boatman? {He picks up 
the oar and with it brushes aside the reeds.) Well, 



I thought so ! There, half-way hidden by the reeds, 
lies flat on his back at the bottom of a skiff that old 
crocodile of a Dominican monk, indulging in eaves- 
dropping. (Anselm lifts high the oar for a heavy 
Mow.) Here, you damned old crocodile, take this 
on installment for your kindness shown me in the 
yard of the convent of the Carmelite nuns at Paris. 
{Meanwhile Vesalius has jumped lo his feel and 
has stepped near to the water edge of the (Rhine.) 

tins. I have missed him, quick as a monkey the 
old crocodile jumped out of the craft into the water 
and now he swims along as agile as an otter. 
(JLnselm picks up a oowlder and flings it after the 
monk,) Look, there he dives like a duck and dis- 
appears beneath the water ; he is the very devil, you 
can't get at him. Lo and behold, there, yonder, he 
shows up again! Such a distance he has been swim- 
ming beneath the water! And now he strikes out 
with all his might! Indeed, the devil swims like a 
god! He will soon reach the German shore. The 
bloodhound of the Inquisition, keeps close on our 
track! Master Vesalius, perhaps you, too, believe 
in the omnipresence of spies? That imp is at home 
in all elements. He would even defy the fire like a 
salamander. Look, there he has reached the German 
shore and makes game of us ! 

Yes. Friend Ansel m, you are a very circumspect 
man. It is you to whom I owe my safety. 

tfLns. Today they will score up a good deal on the 
blacklist of the Holy Inquisition, for that ferreter of 
the Blood Tribunal has overheard all our conver- 
sation. 

Yes. And here in Switzerland! in this lovely 



country where I thought I might be able to live in 
peace for a while ! 

tins. You can do that very well ; but the espion- 
age of the Inquisition is here double and treble, as 
the Netherlandish noblemen prefer the universities 
of Switzerland to those of their native land. 

Here in Basel, Master Vesalius, you have already 
a wonderful reputation as the highest authority of 
anatomy, and you have the opportunity to gain here 
as great a fame as in Paris. From here the light of 
science will flash into the darkest nooks of priest- 
craft. 

Yes. Most of the people studying art and science 
go to Italy, where art as well as science thrive better 
than in any other country. There, in the glorious 
Republic of Venice, we will find a lasting abode ; 
there are to be found more art schools and universi- 
ties than in any other country, and I will teach in 
turn the new genuine science of human anatomy at 
the universities at Bologna, Pisa, Padua and Pavia. 
What a sublime idea to teach anatomy at Bologna, 
where two hundred years ago the anatomical inves- 
tigator, Mondini. was bold enough to dissect for the 
first time a human body. 

jlns. But the bull of pope Boniface VIII. crushed 
this master mind, and in this pioneer of anatomical 
science crushed the revival of anatomical research. 

Yes. Alas! so it did. At all events I must see 
the great master of the brush, Stephen de Kalkar, 
who studied his art with the famous Titian of Venice ; 
he is busy with drawing and engraving the an- 
atomical plates for my treatise on anatomy, Corporis 
Humani Fabrica, which will be published in the 



near future. Sylvia has gone to Padua in order to 
use her wonderful talent for drawing and assist in 
the engraving of the anatomical plates. 

Let us travel among the glorious Alps, and after 
crossing their lofty summits descend from ice and 
snow into the orange groves of Italy to take up again 
our anatomical work at Bologna and Padua. 



SCENE II. 

Vesalius and Sylvia; later de Kalkar. 

Garden with Italian vegetation; middle ground a 
colonnade, at the center of which is the entrance 
of the studio of de Kallcar, the entrance closed by 
gigantic portieres. 

Yes. Is this a dreamland, or reality? What 
heavenly beauty strikes my eyes and holds me spell- 
bound! How wonderfully blue the sky, and how 
high it arches ; how low and gloomy in the Nether- 
lands ! The water clear and sparkling like crystal, 
while a flood of sunlight permeates the air, laden 
with the perfume of all kinds of blossoms and 
flowers. The luxuriant verdure of the orange groves 
revives my eyes, dimmed by dull and lightless sur- 
roundings. A new world, resplendent in the most 
magnificent lavishness and variety of colours, over- 
whelms my soul. 

Sylvia. Here, dear Vesalius, is the paradise we 



have been dreaming of so long ; here we indulge in 
all the beauties of nature. What a change from the 
life you have been leading in the gloom of the grave 
vaults, among coffins and bones of the dead, em- 
braced in a deathlike silence, and in air oppressive 
by the emanations of mould. 

Yes. It was you, dear Sylvia, who made me 
oblivious of those dismal surroundings. 

Sylvia, And still many oHier treats await you as 
soon as we enter the studio of Master de Kalkar. 
There you will have an opportunity of admiring 
masterpieces of the highest order, creations of 
Rafael, Titian and the latter's highly talented dis- 
ciple, de Kalkar. 

And, in addition— oh, Vesalius, my heart is thrilled 
with delight — you will behold the anatomical plates 
intended for your masterwork, Huroani Corporis 
Fabrica, drawn true to nature and accomplished in 
delineation ! And the copper plates are nearing their 
completion, and I dare say in that beautiful work I 
have assisted a little. Cheer up, dear friend, your 
masterpiece of scientific research has been rendered 
immortal by the master hand of our friend, Stephen 
de Kalkar. This, your master treatise of anatomy, 
will make you famous all over Europe as the greatest 
champion of anatomical investigation. De Kalkar 
tells me that your fame as the first authority in 
anatomy has spread like wild-fire from Paris and 
Basel all over the universities of Italy ; hence all the 
ovations which are intended for you by the students 
at the universities at Bologna, Pisa, Pavia and here 
at Padua My dear friend Vesalius, how my heart 
throbs with proud delight and enthusiasm at seeing 



with what phenomenal ascendancy the bright star of 
your life forces its way to the zenith ! 

Now, my dear friend Vesalius, you will understand 
why I cannot as yet yield to the sweet and ardent 
impulse of my heart and comply with your request 
to be united with you forever. 

I do not want to add one more obstacle, the care 
of me, to the many now lying in your path. First 
of all, accomplish your triumphal career, and then 
we will enjoy together what we have achieved. It 
will comfort you to know that even the least progress 
you make on your thorny path will make me exceed- 
ingly happy. 

I see what insurmountable obstacles your enemies 
throw unceasingly in your path. The church, as a 
solid power, harbors a deadly hatred against you, 
and the sword of the Blood Tribunal hangs ever over 
head. Your path is crowded with snares of the In- 
quisition. In addition, there is the open hatred and 
the screened attacks and intrigues of the old anatom- 
ical school of Galenus, the rage of which exceeds all 
bounds. It means destruction and certain death to 
be a heretic. Moreover, you are a renegade of what 
they call anatomical science, that is, the old anatom- 
ical school of Galenus. 

And Vesalius, in spite of all that rank hatred and 
unceasing persecution, such a wonderful success I 

Yes. And all this has been achieved with the aid 
of my dear and fearless helpmate, with jour aid, 
dear Sylvia. 

Sylvia. Look there, the portieres of the studio 
move and Master de Kalkar himself puts in an 
appearance. 



De Kalkar. With all my heart I bid you wel- 
come, Master Vesalius. 

Yes. My heartfelt greetings to you, Master de 
Kalkar, or, as the Italians call you, Giovanni di 
Fiamingo, John the Flemish 1 What a splendid idea 
that you left the gloomy and melancholy atmosphere 
of our native country, and, like a migratory bird, 
came to sunny Italy, with her everlasting azure skies ! 
You are lucky, as you practice your art in the open 
daylight, while we must do our work of investigation 
underground and clandestinely. 

T)e Kalkar. Your fame as a bold investigator 
has preceded you with winged speed across the Alps 
from Paris and Basel, and the Senate of the Republic 
of Venice is about to honor you with a professorship 
at the university of our city. 

Look over there, Master Vesalius, there on the 
wall you see the drawings of your anatomical re- 
search, part of them in drawings, part of them en- 
graved in copper. Those copper engravings will es- 
tablish and secure for all time to come your fame as 
a bold and most successful investigator. 

Yes. Indeed, here I see them in all their detail, 
pictured by your masterhand true to nature and in 
the most accomplished manner. Not many years 
ago you were still a pupil of the great master of the 
brush, Titian, and now you, too, are a most accom- 
plished artist, and people are unable to tell your 
paintings from those of Titian and Rafael. What 
an accomplishment of drawing ! What a brilliancy 
of colours never before witnessed ! 

De Kalkar. If those sketches meet your approval, 
the greater share of your praise is due to my highly 



talented pupil and helpmate, Sylvia, who has 
handled the crayon with unabated enthusiasm. 

Yes. {Grasping Sylvia's hand.) Indeed, she is, 
and has been all along, my high-spirited and untir- 
ing helpmate. (Pointing at one of the paintings.) 
But the unequaled brilliancy of color in your 
paintings, Master de Kalkar, is your own merit and 
your secret ! 

De Kalkar. I know the people believe that the 
Titian art school keeps as a secret the compounding 
and combining of colors, but this is not true, nor is 
the belief that our school has a great advantage over 
the Netherlandish school because in the Netherlands 
mist and dim colors prevail while in Italy all the 
sceneries of nature are resplendent with light and 
color. For, I tell you, Master Vesalius, our school 
has but few colors, neither have we any peculiar 
colors, nor are our colors purer or less adulterated, as 
they say. Our colors are purchasable anywhere, con- 
sequently they are in reach of the Netherlandish 
school; therefore, the two schools do not use colors 
of a different kind. 

The fact that the colors of the Titian school are 
more brilliant depends entirely upon our technique, 
upon the way we lay out the colors. The Venetian 
school possesses this art to a high degree, and com- 
petes, as regards the brilliancy of the colors, with the 
greatest masters of the brush. 

Look here ! First we put down a layer of chalk, 
and in the putting on of any kind of coloration the 
white bed is conducive to the brightness of color as 
well as to impastation. Such an under layer allows 
polish, and renders the colors surprisingly trans- 



lucid and even florid and brilliant. It is true the 
Venetian school, and especially one of its greatest 
champions, Titian, has achieved a great mastery, an 
eminent skill in laying colors, not by different strata, 
one upon the other, but by single and separate dashes 
of the brush, thus producing a wonderful effect. 

To put the colors each at the right spot, without 
being compelled to lay them repeatedly one upon the 
other, and then to polish them, is what preserves the 
original color and its florid freshness. 

Now, Master Vesalius, I have told you all the 
so-called secrets of the Venetian school. 

Now look here, these are the likenesses of the 
champions and martyrs of the great reform move- 
ment in religion as well as in science ; here are the 
three brightest stars among the religious reformers, 
Luther, Zwingli and Melanchthon, and there, three 
other bright and magnificent stars, the reformers of 
anatomical science, Fallopia, Eustachius and the 
likeness of you, Master Vesalius. The latter has 
been painted without assistance of mine by the 
skillful hand of Sylvia, and I declare this painting a 
masterpiece. 

Ves. (He hurries towards Sylvia and embraces 
Tier, after a pause he turns towards de Kalkar.) 
Say, where is the likeness of the great master of an- 
atomical research, Mondini, who had the courage to 
dissect the first human body, thus reviving anatom- 
ical research after anatomical science had remained 
fallow for one thousand years? 

<De Kalkar. Here is Mondini as large as life. 
Ves. {Baring his head and drawing reverently 
near the pictures) if Ossa aulem alia." You great 



master of anatomical research, you were compelled 
to give up the investigation of some bones "lest you 
commit a sin," the bull of pope Boniface VIII having 
threatened with the ban any anatomical research 
and even the maceration of any bones as a capital 
sin. Well, Master Mondini, we your sincere disci- 
ples have made up our minds to annihilate the ban 
that hovers like an incubus over scientific research. 
( Music is heard. ) 

<De Ralkar. I hear music in the clirection of the 
olive grove. That means the students are going to 
gather in front of my studio in order to tender you 
an ovation, Master Vesalius. Let us hurry and 
make some little preparation. 



SCENE III. 
Vesalius' Eulogy of Scientific Research. 

The history of mankind is the history of the 
human mind. It was a long time before the human 
intellect rose above the narrow horizon of the sur- 
rounding physical world and by the study of history 
learned to turn back its mind's eye to bygone cen- 
turies. 

Thus man enabled himself to think and strive 
and sympathize not only with his contemporaries, 
but also with his ancestors and with generations 
that lived centuries before. 

By investigating past centuries, and learning of 
the adversities as well as of the happy events of the 



past, our mind gathers wisdom and grows broader, 
and our view-point becomes more elevated, and we 
feel in our heart the throbbing pulse of mankind. 

Thus the small stage of our surroundings changes 
into a world's stage, and we witness the great his- 
torical drama performed by whole nations in the 
world's theater. 

Indeed it fills our heart with sorrow to see the first 
tender sprout of science exposed to all the wrongs 
and adversities of its time, to see how it has to 
struggle for a paltry existence, and it grieves us, or 
even makes our blood boil with indignation, when 
ignorance, superstition or wickedness treads the 
tender sprout of science under foot like a weed. 

But on the other hand, we cheer the triumph of 
science when its great discoveries open new avenues 
to the human mind ; indeed, we think and investi- 
gate, we discover and suffer and triumph with the 
heroes of science who held the search of truth 
above all. 

Although it was near to hand to apply the "know 
thyself" maxim to our physical nature, and to dissect 
the human body, yet this field remained unbroken 
up to the beginning of the fourteenth century, for 
the ban of the church rested heavily upon scientific 
research. 

What was called medical science was based on 
some few anatomical traditions that had been handed 
down from the ancient Romans, and the belief in 
them was very strong, and even bigoted, and there 
was nobody to prove whether or not those traditions 
were true. 

All the religious thought of ancient times, even 



rip to the middle of the fifteenth century, oondemn 
the dissection of the human body. 

The belief of the ancient Greeks that the souls of 
the deceased had to wander about on the shores of 
the river Styx until their remains had been buried, 
rendered any anatomical investigation impossible. 
The Romans, too, entertained an equal abhorrence of 
dissections of the human body, considering it as a 
desecration of the dignity of man. 

Moreover, even accidents and casualties did not 
facilitate any casual anatomical discoveries, as it 
was the first and principal duty of any commander 
to have those buried who had been killed in battle. 

We read that the citizens of Athens condemned to 
death one of their best commanders, who, after a 
victorious battle, in his zeal to take the best advant- 
age of his victory by close pursuit of the enemy, 
neglected the burial of the dead. 

Although the religious views of that age were not 
opposed to the dissection of animals, we see what 
kind of views governed public life, for Democritos, 
who was engaged in dissections of animals, was 
declared insane by his fellow-citizens and was not 
permitted to dwell among them. 

It was also a religious custom, when somebody 
happened to find human remains, or even but parts 
of them, to cover them with soil ; a custom which 
put any part of the human anatomy out of reach of 
anatomical investigation, piety even covering with a 
handful of soil any bones outlasting the decay of the 
corpse. 

Small wonder, then, that Claudius Galenus, who in 
the year 131 a. d. was a physician at the fencing 



Bchool at Perganms, went to the university at Alex- 
andria in Egypt in order to see a complete human 
skeleton, and that he, later on, sent his pupils to 
Germany to study anatomy on the giant bodies of 
the Teutons slain in battle, as the Romans then 
cremated their dead. 

In this manner some observations superficial and 
more or less accidental were made; for instance, 
when animals offered as a sacrifice were killed, in 
cases of wounded people, and in the embalming of 
the deceased. And these few observations were for 
centuries the only anatomical acquisitions, and 
there was no anatomical science to speak of. Even 
the 4 'tarecheutes," those men in Egypt whose office it 
was to embalm the corpses of the deceased, did not 
understand anything about anatomy, and they were 
bombarded with stones after doing the embalming. 

Considering all these religious prejudices cherished 
by the people, the obstacles in the way of dissections 
of human bodies seemed insurmountable. 

It was only at the schools of the priests that a cer- 
tain amount of anatomical knowledge was handed 
down for centuries in the form of traditions. 
Aristotle, a genius of scientific investigation and the 
first scientific naturalist in ancient times, did 
splendid work and made admirable discoveries by 
the dissection of animals. His classic accuracy and 
his wonderful sagacity in systematizing the animal 
kingdom deserve the highest praise. 

The first medical college was founded 320 a. d. at 
Alexandria, and here the first dissections of the 
human body were made. Celsus reports that even 



vivisections on criminals were performed by Hero- 
philus and Erisistratus. He says : 

"They cut open criminals who by the order of the 
king were taken out of the dungeons and put at the 
disposal of Herophilus and Erisistratus, who, on 
cutting them open, holding their breath, glanced in 
wonderment at all that had been before occult and 
unknown." 

This is proven by the fact that they discovered 
the lacteals of the intestines, which as a rule can 
not be discerned unless artificially injected, while 
their plexus on the intestines of those committing 
suicide during the process of digestion are distinctly 
visible to the naked eye and look like the ramifica- 
tions of small blood vessels injected with milk. 

The fact that Erisistratus knew the difference 
between sensory and motory nerves is another con- 
clusive evidence that he made part of his discoveries 
in the living human body. 

How limited anatomical knowledge must have 
been up to the time of Erisistratus is evidenced by 
the fact that it was he who demonstrated the fallacy 
of the belief that the fluid part of our food passes 
through the windpipe. In addition he discovered 
the valves of the heart. 

It was in the year 131 a. d. that Claudius Galenus 
taught anatomy at Rome. He had made his medical 
studies at Alexandria in Egypt because that medical 
school owned a complete human skeleton. In all 
probability he used but monkeys and dogs for his 
own anatomical dissections and demonstrations. In 
consequence of his investigations and discoveries, and 
the treatises he wrote on anatomy and other medical 



disciplines, he was considered as an infallible 
authority, not only in anatomy but also in medicine 
in general. For fourteen centuries the books he had 
published had a reputation not to be touched, and 
were revered as a kind of holy writ in medical mat- 
ters. The blind veneration of his books has been 
unlimited, and even now anybody who dares charge 
Galenus with an error or a mistake is immediately 
ostracized. 

All the books published in regard to his writings 
are but commendatory, and nobody until Mondini 
investigated anatomical subjects independently. 
The blind believers and fanatics even went so far 
that where he disclosed the anatomical errors of 
Galenus they were inclined to believe that a change 
had taken place in the human anatomy since the 
time of Galenus rather than believe that the latter 
had made some mistake. And you know as well as 
I that at present strict laws prohibit dissections of 
the human body, and the cemeteries are protected by 
grave wardens and by a special law. All those are 
severely punished who even keep company with 
grave robbers. 

After a lapse of so many centuries, at the beginning 
of the fourteenth century a man arose who dared to 
dissect a corpse, and by so doing revived scientific 
anatomical research and the study of anatomy. It 
was Mondini, Professor in Bologna, who dissected 
two corpses and caused a regeneration of anatomical 
investigation, his publication on anatomy gaining 
the highest repute. 

But the church responded quicldy, and in 
1300 Pope Boniface VIII anathematized the reviving 



anatomical research. Ecclesiastical power did not 
mind the blind belief in the anatomical teachings of 
Galenus, and, moreover, sympathized with such a 
belief in the unbounded authority of that man, as 
such an orthodox belief caused a stagnation of the 
human intellect and made the bitterly hated 
progress of science impossible. 

In that famous bull of Pope Boniface VIII excom- 
munication is threatened against all those who 
might dare dissect a human corpse or macerate 
human bones. The church power fears that the 
monks who are to a great extent engaged in medical 
practice— most especially here in Italy— might be- 
come averse to praying and fasting. 

The great and enthusiastic investigator, Mondini, 
suffered greatly in his researches by the bull of Pope 
Boniface VIII, and we are shocked and stirred with 
woful indignation on learning of the infamous con- 
ditions into which science was forced by the church 
and in contemplating what a master mind like that 
of Mondini must have suffered when writing down 
those impressive words : 

Ossa auiem alia quae sunt infra basilar e, non 
bene ad sensum apparent nisi ossa ilia decoquanlur, 
sed propter peccalum omitlere consuevu 

Words by which the great investigator tells us that 
he had to give up any further anatomical research 
through fear of committing a sin and inviting the 
fulminations of the pope. 

Now at the present time the spirit of scientific re- 
search has been awakened, and the investigators of 
truth rival one another in generous competition. 
New and important discoveries follow one another 



almost uninterruptedly, and in all the cities of 
France, Italy and Germany chairs and professorships 
are created ; the ban under which the intellectual 
power of man had to suffer for centuries is broken, 
although we still have to suffer from endless perse- 
cution. 

I have devoted my life to anatomical research, but 
the furious hatred of the church and the malicious 
intrigues of my relentless enemies among the medical 
profession have kept pace with the progress of my 
investigations. 

I had to leave Louvaine, in Belgium, because my 
life was endangered by the Holy Tribunal of the 
Church ; I had to leave Paris because my life was 
endangered by the rank intrigues of my relentless 
enemy, the famous exponent of anatomy, Professor 
Sylvius. 

But now I am with you, my friends, and neither I 
or anybody else has a right to complain of his mis- 
fortune and his danger in the midst of those shining 
lights in the province of religion and science whose 
likenesses the master hand of de Kalkar has placed 
before us. My dear friends, behold the likenesses 
of those heroes, those champions, those martyrs of 
liberty of conscience and of untrammeled research, 
who have suffered untold misery, unceasing and 
relentless persecution, and even death! Behold the 
likenesses of those heroes — Savanarola, Wickleff, 
Hubs, Luther, Melanchthon, Calvin, Zwingli, Ulrich 
de Hutten, Copernicus, Eustachius and Fallopia — 
and then let us bare our heads and solemnly vow : 
''Onward, on the path of enlightenment and progress 
of the human race !" 



The audience baring their heads cheer and 
exclaim: 

"Onward on the path of enlightenment! Down 
with the stultification of the human mind by popery 
and priestcraft !" 

OVATION TENDERED TO SYLVIA. 

Henceforth thou shalt be our Queen, 

Thou giveth us peace and happiness, 

Let art and science dwell among us. 

Let us investigate and teach the human mind, 

Let us soften and ennoble, edify and comfort 

The human heart by the mighty charm of music ; 

Let us herald and announce by eloquent words, 

The misgivings and ideals 

That hover over the depth of thy soul ! 

In the flood of sweet music 

Kindred souls melt into sweet harmony ! 

Here is no clatter of arms ! 

Pencils and chisels and thoughts 

Are our tools and our weapons ! 

Here the life blood is ebbing pure, 

Neither poisoned by hatred nor by superstition. 

OVATION TENDERED TO STEPHEN DE KALKAR. 

Thou master of the crayon and the brush, 

You embellish our life and comfort our hearts ; 

You make our souls swell with noble feelings, 

You charm our eyes, you refresh our minds 

Cast down with the burdens of life ! 

Thou raiseth us by the magic of thy art, 

By the beauty of thy drawing and the splendor of thy colors ; 

Thy magic wand renders us spellbound, 

A wondrous world of forms and coJors 

Thou pourest into our devoted souls, 

Refining our minds and ennobling our hearts ! 

Thou rouseth the seeds of virtue slumbering there. 



In silent and sweet devotion our souls melt away, 
Blended into the sweet harmony of form and color, 
We grow converted into believers in beauty. 

OVATION TENDERED TO VESALIUS. 

Bold investigator of truth, be welcome ; 

Who edifies and ennobles our souls, 

Who invigorates and enthuses our hearts, 

Who implants new ideas into our minds. 

Thou art the master of solemn science, 

Thou hast unraveled the wonders of our body — • 

How it is built up to a wonderful creation. 

Three brilliant stars sparkle on the firmament 

Of religious reformation, Luther, Zwingli, Melanchthon ; 

Three other bright stars eclipse in science, 

Fallopia, Eustachius and Vesalius. 

Thou, the brightest of those three stars, 

We adorn with the laurel of undying glory. 

fins. {Who has been an interested observer.) 
Well, now let us hear from the stranger. 

Stranger. I merely happen to be among this 
gathering of enthusiastic students and promi- 
nent scholars, and therefore, although appreciating 
your kind invitation, I feel somewhat embarrassed 
and hesitate to give my opinion. 

$Lns. Never mind, let us hear what you have 
to say. 

ADDRESS OF STRANGER. 

Research be free of fetters and barriers, 

Untrammeled be the realm of thought, 

We are endeavoring to reveal the mysteries of Nature, 

Investigating matter living aud in the state of rot ; 

And to unriddle the enigmas of Nature, 

And to disclose her most occult workshops, 

We diligently study the sublime creation 



From the bounds of earth to the heavens' tops. 

We rake in the bowels of the earth, and of man, 

Of more enlightenment continually in search, 

We discover new worlds, and cross the oceans ; 

Liberty of thought and conscience is our church. 

Not on the vivid wings of imagination, 

For the whys and wherefores of things do we scan ; 

Our means of investigation are free thoughts 

That falter not at barriers nor at ban. 

By no sense of fear, and no enfeebling doubts, 

Shall the champions of enlightenment be awed, 

The world must undergo a severe and mighty test, 

To discover what is true and what is fraud. 

How much the people believe and how little they know, 

From the bottom of the retort is all too plainly shown — 

Our chemistry distills the essence of the words, 

We examine to the core, and not the crust alone. 

Once more the earth we've weighed, and carefully measured, 

'Tis not the center of the world, as falsely we were told ; 

A new and grander epoch is now about to dawn 

That will shame to abject flight the darkness of the old. 

The oceans are crossed and the heavens measured, 

All that has being in the great sun's light, 

All that breathes in darkness, or in secrecy, 

Ail that soars in yon ethereal height — 

What causes to heave the bosom of the ocean, 

What causes the lap of the great earth to quake, 

All this we endeavor to discover ; 

The mighty flood of new thought makes the whole world 

shake. 
Thinking and investigating are our sins, 
Sins we readily admit, 
Sins that we call virtues, 
And are not ashamed of it. 
The sin to think our own thoughts, 
And place no faith on literal creed, 
Is a sin that edifies our soul 
And makes the priestcraft fear, indeed ! 

119 



Sins cherished by the thinker and investigator, 

Which we by no indulgence can dissemble, 

Sins that we forgive ourselves, 

Are sins that do not make us tremble. 

That's why the powers of the dark hem and hem, 

The swelling tide of wakening thought endeavoring to stem. 

(The stranger after having finished his stunt 
midst general applause is approached by ^Lnselrru) 

fins. Well, stranger, are those beautiful thoughts 
you have expounded before this audience thoughts 
of your own? 

Stranger. I thought I did the right thing by 
giving expression to the shibboleth of this honorable 
audience, my own opinion is of no value among such 
a crowd of fine scholars. 

Ans. But I think you will not hesitate to take a 
solemn oath as to the truth of the magnificent 
thoughts which you have given such an eloquent 
expression? 

Stranger. Gentlemen, I have expounded your 
ideas, but I am too little a scholar to prove the truth 
of your opinions. 

fins. Can you swear as to the truthfulness of 
your nose? 

Stranger. I can take it upon my solemn oath 
that my nose is not yours. 

Ans. But this is not your nose ! Look here, there 
it lies on the ground! (He seizes the nose of the 
stranger and flings it to the ground.) 

Stranger. Of course this is not my nose, as it is 
but the case of my nose ! 

Ans. (Pointing with his index finger at Hie nose 



of the stranger.) And this your own nose, is not a 
nose at all ; it looks more like a cucumber. 

Stranger* There are no red encumbers ; my nose 
is frost bitten and therefore I had to encase it. 

£ns. Did you become frost bitten in Italy or in 
the chilly waters of the Rhine ! I think you put 
your so-called nose too deep in the cups and have 
dyed it in claret. Is your hair also frost bitten that 
you have covered it with a silken cap? Perhaps you 
have no hair at all and are bald headed ! 

Stranger. That is true 1 I have suffered a great 
deal from gout in my bead, causing the falling out 
of my hair. 

$Lns. You mean you have been looking too deeply 
into the cup, and that has brought on the gout. 
Maybe you are suffering from a tonsure? Let us see ! 
{He tears the silken cap from Vie stranger's head 
and a tonsure is visible.) There you are, you old 
crocodile, your head has been anointed. This time 
it means the extreme unction and you will get it. I 
will give you an opportunity to divulge now your 
own opinion and the kind of truth on which you 
swear. Such sublime truth ought to be expounded 
from a sublime spot, and for that purpose we will 
hang you to that tree over there. It is a good idea 
that you carry a rope about your person. (Ansehn 
pulls aside the light upper garment of the stranger 
and the cord around Vie loins of the friar becomes 
visible.) 

Stranger. I am an humble servant of the Lord, 
and without any worldly ambition. I do not need 
an elevated standpoint. I can preach the truth at 
the spot where I now stand. 



$lns. There is no standpoint in question. In mid- 
air one cannot stand, and you will have either to fly, 
as the angels do, or to swing as the rogues do. And 
you won't do as an angel with your tonsure, with 
your red nose, your fat belly and your black heart. 

Stranger. I can speak much better, having solid 
ground beneath my feet. 

fins. If you get embarrassed in your speech I will 
help you along by giving you some catch words. For 
instance, when you came forth from under the altar 
at Louvaine, where you were hidden in order to spy 
upon Master Vesalius, you started with the following 
terms : 

"From our nets there is no escape, 
We scheme and grab, we swindle and take, 
A heretic never slips our hooks, 
We hound his heels, and in his wake 
We follow ; from town to town, from land to land; 
On every hand our snares are spread 
For such as will not cringe the knee and lowly bow the 
head." 

"Of all those sapient, reformatory birds, 
With their elusive creeds and glittering words ; 
Of them we make an easy disposition 

Through the systematic workings of the Spanish Inquisi- 
tion !" 

And when I was standing at the well in the yard 
of the Carmelite nunnery at Paris, and had a rope 
around my neck, you gallow-bird greeted me with 
the words : 

"Down with him to the bottom of the well, 
The deeper and darker, so much the better ; 
Down there among the rats and toads, 
Tortured the while by physical and mental agony, 



And unable to be reached by the hand of a friend, 
His stubborn mind will soon soften. 
Don't hesitate, don't shrink back ; 
Take hold of him, collar him." 

But I don't want to pay you in the same coin. I 
don't say, "Down with you into the deep hole." I 
say, up with you nearer to heaven. 

<Per aspera ad aslra, gloria est in excelsis. 

Through the difficulties of some hemp in the shape 
of a noose you will go up to the stars, up there is 
glory for you. Indeed within this hempen neck- 
wear you will feel like a thistle-finch in the hemp. 
Well, come on comrades, take hold of his carcass 
and collar him ; the low shall be raised ! You old 
crocodile, you are too good for this earthly world ! 

Monk. ( With trembling voice.) My dear friends, 
I am a humble but honest man. I am satisfied with 
remaining in this world, and I feel happy to be in 
your company. 

&ns. Well, you are a humble man, but you will 
soon be raised to a higher position. (Pointing at 
the limb of the tree.) And you are an honest man, 
because you have honestly earned this rope. You 
are trembling because you are afraid that rope may 
be strong enough to do its duty and make your 
anatomy swing, while I, for my part, am afraid that 
the rope as well as the limb of the tree may not be 
strong enough to do you full justice. Well, comrades, 
come on and assist me a little in getting this old 
crocodile in full swiDg. 

{Some of Vie students draw nearer and sinselm 
busies himself with the rope that girds the loins of 
the monk. The monk shows signs of great anxiety.) 



Monk. Hail to art and science! My dear friends, 
don't make any mistake ! 

Sins. Hail to the art and science of making a 
noose. Don't be disturbed! We won't make any mis- 
take, we will make an artful noose that guarantees 
the scientifically precalculated result of your swing- 
ing ; but if the rope or the limb of the tree breaks, 
we will take it as a judgment of the Lord that you 
are not the right man, and we will set you free. But 
if you prefer to get the Lord's judgntent in the water, 
according to the custom, it is your choice. 

You know that procedure very well, for, as far as I 
remember, you were, at Basel in Switzerland, one of 
the foremost instigators who caused a great many 
old women to be indicted as witches and sentenced 
to be thrown in the river Rhine from the bridge at 
Basel, to invoke the judgment of the Lord, in order 
to find out whether or not they were guilty. If they 
floated along with their heads above water till they 
arrived at a certain spot down the river, they were 
considered to be innocent and were fished out, but if 
they sank and were drowned it was considered proof 
in the form of a judgment of the Lord that they were 
witches. 

Monlc Please throw me into the water. Let me 
have a fair trial. Let heaven prove my innocence. 

?lns. With you we cannot proceed in the cus- 
tomary way, as such a chunk of fat would naturally 
float on the surface of the water ; but if such a fat- 
bellied corporation were to float beneath the surface 
of the water that would mean a miracle and a judg- 
ment of the Lord. 

Monlc You are perfectly right, my dear sir, that 



would prove that you have not got the right man 
and that I am not guilty. The finger of the Lord 
will suspend the operation of the laws of nature, and 
that will prove that I am innocent and one of the 
most faithful sons. 

tins. Now we are sure that you are the right man. 
You accept readily this kind of Lord's judgment, 
because you know very well that you are able to 
render it favorable, as you are an expert swimmer. 
It was you, old crocodile, who was lying flat on your 
back in the bottom of the little skirl on the river 
Rhine in the neighborhood of Basel in Switzerland, 
to spy upon Master Vesalius and myself and over- 
hear our conversation. 

When I discovered you hiding among the reeds, 
you hopped like a frog into the water, and dived like 
a duck and swam a long distance beneath the water, 
as fast and as cleverly as an otter. You see you are 
the right man, and here is the right rope, and up 
there is the right limb. You are exactly the right 
man to be roasted in hell, and the devil will be 
delighted to get you. You are trembling. Are you 
cold? Wait a little ! Within a few minutes you 
will be in purgatory ; down there, there is a warm 
climate. 

Monk. Boys, you are going to commit a capital 
sin. Let me give you my benediction. When I am 
gone you will soon realize what an awful crime you 
have committed in killing a faithful and humble 
servant of the Lord. 

fins. Hem, do you now feel inclined to do some 
good, after having spread agony and unhappiness 
for a lifetime? Most certainly we will afford you 



at the end of your cursed life an opportunity to do 
some blessed work, but you can best bless the world 
by being hanged to that tree over there ! 

Well, comrades, hoist him ! ( They lift him and 
hang him lo the limb of the tree by the rope he 
wears around his loins.) 

tins. This is the latest in the way of a pulpit. 
Now you can preach your gospel from an elevated 
position. But mind; for the future keep out of our 
way — you spy of the Inquisition, you denouncer of 
the Blood Tribunal — for the next time we will place 
the rope now girding your belly, higher up, around 
your neck. Well, don't forget your piece! 

{The monk gesticulates violently and his body 
swings round against the tree.) 

tins. 

Of all those sapient, reformatory birds, 

With their elusive creeds and glittering words — 

The Monk. ( Willi expressive gesticulations.) 

Of them we make an easy disposition 

Through the systematic workings of the Spanish Inquisi- 
tion. 
A heretic never slips our hooks, 
We hound his heels, and in his wake we follow — 

(ti trumpet blast is heard and an estafelle of the 
(Republic of Venice, displaying the Venetian colors, 
enters. He unfolds a portfolio and hands over lo 
Vesalius a parchment roll to which there is attached 
the great seal of the Republic of Venice. Vesalius 
unfolds the scroll and displays Us contents lo the 
bystanders?) 

One of them. Long live Master Vesalius ! The 
Senate of the Republic of Venice has invested him 



with a professorship at our university. Let us pro- 
ceed thither. ( The whole audience departs. 7he 
monk starts again to swing his body violently 
against the tree, the limb he is suspended from 
breaks, and the friar drops heavily to the ground, 
hallooing while he is lying on Vie ground): 

For such rank reformers of the holy creed 
Mental and physical anguish is a crying need. 

Jumping to his feel and dragging the rope and 
limb of the tree behind him he shouts: 
I must see what is going on now. 



SCENE IV. 
Vesalius, Sylvia, sinselm. 

Yes. Dear Sylvia, to all appearances the day has 
arrived when your wish will be satisfied, and obstacles 
will no longer block my way, as all the black, 
threatening clouds have disappeared. 

Though still at some distance, the realization of 
my ideal looms up; an untrammeled path for 
scientific research. I shall be under the highest 
protectorate, that of the emperor, Charles V. A 
friend of mine has sent me word that my appoint- 
ment by the emperor as chief surgeon of the Imperial 
Netherlandish Army is imminent. 

Sylvia. Oh, what a glorious prospect ! Such a 
high position of confidence opens an entirely new 
avenue to my friend Vesalius, placiDg scientific in- 
vestigation under the powerful protection of the 



emperor. This, my friend Vesalius, is the fruit of 
your untiring efforts. 

Ves. Indeed, dear Sylvia, the splendor reflected 
from that great and mighty ruler upon my pursuits 
will put an end to the unceasing wiles and intrigues 
of my enemies. 

&ns- Oh, Master Vesalius, I hasten to beg you, do 
stay here ; do not respond to such an appointment ; 
do not give up the refuge and protection you have 
found in the Republic of Venice. Here you have 
found everything to be wished, and all that you 
deserved and all that you needed to protect you 
against the devilish artifices of your professional 
brethren and against the deadly and venomous fangs 
of the black hydra. Here you are under the protec- 
tion of a liberal republic ; here science and all the 
fine arts find shelter and thrive better than in any 
other part of Europe; here hundreds of students of 
every class and age, and among them gentlemen of 
rank and fortune, listen to your teachings with the 
greatest enthusiasm. Here, Master Vesalius, you are 
not only esteemed, but you are also cherished, as has 
been proven by the magnificent ovations the students 
of the universities at Bologna, Pisa and Padua have 
tendered you when you have lectured to them. 

Do not forget the great honor the Senate of the 
Republic of Venice has bestowed upon you by con- 
ferring a professorship of this university upon you. 

On the other hand, do not forget to recall our 
former abode, Louvaine, that hot-bed of priestcraft, 
where you were nearly undone; remember Paris, 
where your most malignant professional and religi- 
ous enemies have full sway, and where recently a 



new, and, mind you, the deadliest enemy of our cause 
has arisen. Paris is the stronghold of theology, and 
sets the example for England and Germany, but the 
rest of Europe is under the lead of the university of 
Bologna, the principal exponent of jurisprudence. 
Here, in the Republic of Venice, we are free of all 
taxes, and here we have law courts to our own 
liking. 

My opinion is that the whole affair is nothing but 
a devilish intrigue of your professional and religious 
enemies, who have picked out that position for you 
and who would not hesitate to recommend you for 
the exalted position of body physician of the emperor 
in order to have you near enough to entangle you in 
the snares and intrigues at the imperial court. 

And then, Master Vesalius, mind Madrid, as there 
is more danger lurking there for you than even at 
Rome. 

Master Vesalius, remember the great champions of 
our cause, in the province of science as well as in 
the realm of religion ; because of their aspirations 
for religious reform aud progress of the human mind 
they have suffered torturing imprisonment, they 
have met death at the stake, and all this through the 
instrumentality of the Spanish Inquisition. 

Yes. Dear friend Anselm, you are always on the 
lookout for the safety of my life. As regards my 
desire to enter this new career you know very well 
that no personal ambition is guiding me, but I feel 
confident by the splendor and under the powerful 
influence of the imperial sun scientific research 
promises to take an unprecedented turn. I do not 
know of any other means to further untrammeled 



scientific investigation to such an extent. 

You say a new enemy — the deadliest and most 
powerful — has risen against our cause ; what is his 
name, please? 

£ns. Who guarantees your life, Master Vesalius? 
I say a living beggar can achieve more than a dead 
king ! On my knees I entreat you : Don't accept 
that offer ; if you do, it will lead you to ruin and 
death. 

You remember the friar, who, at the time we were 
in Paris, tried might and main, in fact with fanatical 
perseverance, to establish a new order. Well, he has 
succeeded ; the pope has sanctioned the order of the 
Jesuits, an order that will soon be more powerful 
than even the Spanish Inquisition. The name of 
that friar is Ignatius de Loyola, and perhaps the 
emperor himself already belongs to the order. 



ACT IV, 

SCENE I. 

Scene in the Netherlands. Camp of one of the 
armies of Emperor Charles V, Imperial soldiers of 
different stripe; then, Chaplain tiquila; later, a 
(Dominican friar, and last Vesalius, surgeon of 
the Imperial army. Singing in a number of 
tents, shaking of dice on drumheads, sutler's 
women and children of soldiers, wenches; to the 
right some howitzer men. 

First Soldier. Hello comrades, is not the life of 
a soldier a jolly affair? Just now we are in the 
Netherlands, last fall we started from Italy and 
crawled over the Alps into Germany; in Italy we 
drank wine to our hearts' content, in Germany we 
drank beer by the hogshead; next year we'll goto 
Hungary to spank the Turks and have plenty of fun 
with their tomboys. Once in a while a battle royal, 
and as dessert plenty of marauding and plundering 
and a jolly company of fine lassies, and, in addition, 
drinking wine, singing songs and shaking the bones. 

If the soldier only wants, the whole world belongs 
to him. We, the emperor's rich mantles, fight for 
his vast dominion and world-wide fame. Slaughter 
and marauding are customary in warfare, but of 
course if a civilian does the same it is a crime for 
which he must hang. We devastate the fields of our 
friends as well as of our enemies; if we please we 
ride or march across the ripe crops, warfare knows 



no mercy and no human feeling. We do not pro- 
duce anything, we only consume and destroy what 
the civilians have produced by hard and untiring 
work ; the civilian is a mule, that must plod from 
the early morning until night to feed us and clothe 
us in rich mantles and equip us with weapons, and 
he must labor to make anew or repair what we have 
destroyed or ruined. His place is in the tread-mill, 
while to us the whole world is free. 

If we do not get what is coming to us, we take 
everything we run across. Spoils is the custom of 
warfare, and the soldier likes to put something aside 
for a rainy day when he is disabled or too old to 
slaughter, pillage and lay waste. 

Huzza, here is the last piece of jewelry that belongs 
to me ! How it does sparkle ! It's all pure gold and 
genuine gems. We have not got our pay for many 
months, let us shake the bones ! 

Put down ten gold florins, three rounds will show 
to whom the treasure belongs! Look here how it 
sparkles! 

A. Howitzer. Here are ten gold florins. Why 
don't you put one of your wenches at stake? You 
have about half a dozen and I myself need one badly 
to hang myself and those jewels on, if I happen to 
be lucky with the dice! 

First Soldier. Why not! Which one? 

The Stranger. I guess that black-eyed one over 
there is a dainty morsel. I like her best. I'll put 
up ten more gold florins! 

First Soldier. Do you think I don't know what 
my goods are worth? She is a thoroughbred, and 
you will soon find out that she has at least one hun- 



dred gold florins' worth of wonderful charms about 
her body ; put up thirty more gold florins and three 
rounds of the best wine! 

Howitzer. Our army drags along hundreds of 
women and lassies of every variety, and like the 
sunshine they belong to everybody, but you act as if 
we were lacking wenches to suit everybody. 

First Soldier. That's all right! But there are 
very few of her kind. Only wait. Tomorrow you 
will have quite another opinion. She is one of the 
most delicious tid-bits. Well, is it a match? 

Howitzer. Done! Here is the wager and there 
the wine. Shake the bones ! Ah, that is a good 
start ! Now it is on me. Ouch ! To the devil with 
all the dice ! {Re raises the dumper.) This to you, 
but if I lose I shall shake your bones ! 

First Soldier, (Placing a pistol before him.) 
But not before I have honey-combed your stuffings. 
(He shakes Hie dice.) 

Howitzer. Well, what have you got this time? 
Ha, ha, still worse than my cast! Throw the third 
round! Hem! now it is on me. {He throws dice.) 
There you have a proof of my skill ! Indeed a 
master stroke! That girl is mine. ((Raising the 
dumper.) This to your very good health; tomorrow 
we'll get plenty of plunder ; Ghent is a very rich 
city. Tomorrow, I bet, I shall have the finest jewelry 
by the bushel. 

First Soldier. What is going on over there at the 
howitzers? (He draws near to the group standing 
around one of the biggest mortars.) What are you 
doing? 

One of the Howitzer Men. We are about to send 



from th© biggest howitzer a morning salute into the 
camp of the heretics. We are urging the chaplain, 
Aquila, to baptize the cannon ball, but he don't like 
the idea. 

ttquila. Boys, .that won't do, baptismal service is 
a sacred service. 

One of the Howilzers. And this iron message to 
be sent into the camp of the new believers is a deed 
agreeable to God ! 

ttquila. We don't want to outrage the name of 
the Lord! 

(tf. ^Dominican friar enters, -placing himself 
behind ttquila.) 

Howitzer. Do christen that cannon ball the 
"morning salute." As soon as the ball gets the 
blessing of the Lord, it will be an easy task for it to 
smash up a dozen of heretics. 

(Dominican friar standing behind Aquila motions 
Vie howitzers to place XLquila in the mortar.) 

Friar* Aquila is latin, and means eagle; why 
don't you send the eagle up into the clouds until he 
has had plenty of soaring, and, stretching out all 
fours, like a tossed frog, drops to the ground in the 
camp of the backsliders ! 

{The howilzers cheering the friar cram JLquila 
into one of the big howilzers and pour powder into 
the mortar pit. Meanwhile the friar is looting at 
something in the distance and shows signs of 
unrest.) 

Friar. (To himself.) There comes one out of 
whose way I have to keep, (ylloud.) Well, boys, 
do it well and send him over to those of his kind. I 
am in a hurry. I have some important business. 



{One of the Howitzers grasps the lunt and tries 
to touch off the charge. Vesalius enters.) 

Yes. Comrades, what is going on here ? 

One of the Howitzers. We are just going to shoot 
that black sheep over into the camp of the heretics, 
but the powder don't take. This shows that he is in 
league with the devil. 

Yes. {Scrutinizing the powder). The powder is 
damp and won't ignite. 

Howitzer. If so, I am going to fetch some dry 
powder. 

Yes. Hold on, are you not ashamed of yourself ? 
Look at your right hand ! Was it not lacerated a 
couple of months ago, and who was it patched it up? 

Howitzer. Mr. Surgeon, you did. 

Yes. Well, are you not afraid that that hand 
might become paralyzed while assisting in the mur- 
der of that poor army chaplain ? Comrades get him 
out of the mortar and do not be guilty of committing 
such a dastardly deed ! 

(A. bugle sounds.) Hello, it's the signal for 
decampment ! 

{All disperse in a great hurry.) 



SCENE II. 
Yesalius and JLnselm. 

Yes. Well, dear friend Anselm, what is the news? 

tins. Good news, Master Vesalius, the desire of 
all the nations of Europe to reform the church from 
head to foot is growing stronger every day, but the 



cunning statesoraft of Rome does its best to ensnare 
all Europe. 

Yes. Small wonder ! The great offence occasioned 
by the highest exponents of the church, as well as by 
the common priesthood, has created a strong desire 
for reform. 

£ns. The immorality of the priesthood and their 
greediness for money, displayed in the selling of in- 
dulgence, is fearful, and the ignorance of the clergy 
is shocking. The study of the ancient languages, 
recently awakened, educates the scholars and leads 
them to read the Bible in the original Hebrew and 
Greek text, but the clergy has not been slow to de- 
clare the study of the ancient laDguages a dangerous 
heresy ; because the priesthood fear that the reading 
of the Bible might cause an investigation of the 
present disgraceful conditions of the church. 

Well, how is His Most Gracious Imperial Majesty? 

Yes. I look on the Emperor as one of the greatest 
rulers in history. 

Sins. Th© Emperor, with his twenty years, was 
when elected thoughtful and prudent far beyond 
his age, and when on his twenty-fourth birthday he 
got the news — indeed, the finest birthday present he 
ever got — that the French army had been utterly de- 
feated, the greatest part of the French nobility de- 
stroyed, and the King Francis himself made prisoner, 
the Emperor's countenance did not betray exultation 
and he even forbade the customary public rejoicings, 
like bonfires, saying that such ought to be reserved 
for a victory over the Turk, the enemy of Christen- 
dom, but not practised when a great Christian king 
had met with a great misfortune. 



Ves. But this conduct of the Emperor called 
forth the general admiration of all those present. 
Do not forget, friend Anselm, how the Emperor 
treated hie illustrious captive, the King of France, 
when he paid him a visit on his sick bed. "Sir," 
said King Francis, "you come to witness the death 
of your prisoner !" But the Emperor replied : "You 
are not my prisoner, but my friend and brother. I 
have no other desire than to give you your liberty 
and all the satisfaction you desire." 

Sins. But were these consoling words followed by 
corresponding actions? King Francis was utterly 
in despair, not being able to obtain his liberty ex- 
cept on terms dishonorable to himself and injurious 
to the interests of his country, and he resolved to 
abdicate his crown, and this magnanimous resolve 
soon resounded throughout all Europe. 

On the other hand, the Emperor's subsequent 
dealings with his prisoner, King Francis, proved 
that the Emperor's conduct had not been impelled 
by a virtuous impulse of piety or humility, but by 
hypocrisy. He has been brought up in the strictest 
rules of what they call religion, and has his outside 
demeanor under full control. 

And in the counsel that was held, Duke d'Alva, — 
beware of him, Master Vesalius! — insisted on the 
most rigorous terms as the price of the King's free- 
dom, while the bishop of Ossero recommended the 
more magnanimous course of liberating the king on 
honorable terms in order to secure an honorable 
peace. But no, the most exorbitant and humiliating 
terms were settled upon, which King Francis in- 
dignantly rejected. 



Yes* If the Emperor were not such a high-minded, 
mighty and virtuous ruler, the great ones of the 
earth would not resort to his court. 

tins. In spite of his sagacity the emperor 
relies and acts upon the advice of his counsel- 
lors, the two Granvilles, father and son, except 
that when the interests of the Roman church are 
concerned the emperor has hiB advisers among the 
clergy, in whom he places great reliance and whom 
in most cases he obeys implicitly. Is not the King 
of France regarded as a model of chivalry ? He has 
a reputation for valor, generosity and gallantry, but 
the Emperor did not care to outrage the feelings of 
his favorite sister, Eleanor, by causing her to marry 
the Prince of Bourbon, the traitor to King Francis. 
And how about Margaret de Valois, the pearl of 
pearls, as she is called, the sister of the King of 
France, a distinguished lady and celebrated for her 
natural endowments, her learning, her gracefulness 
of manner, and devotedness to her brotker — was she 
not accused of heresy, because she at all times 
afforded an asylum to those prosecuted for their new 
opinions on the subject of religion? 

The professors of the College of Navarre had her 
ridiculed on the stage at Paris as a senseless person, 
whose head had been turned by sectarianism, and 
the Sorbonne — our old acquaintance at Paris — that 
formidable body declared her as a heretic, and tried 
even to rouse the king's indignation against his own 
sister ; and her book was listed among the suspected 
publications printed without the permission of the 
faculty of theology. Master Vesalius, there are most 
powerful persons behind the throne, against whom 



even the emperor could hardly give you any protec- 
tion ! The favors heaped upon the Prince of Bour- 
bon, the traitor to the king of France, roused the in- 
dignation of the Spanish nobles, and the Marquis de 
Villana, whose palace the emperor had assigned to 
the culpable Prince de Bourben, dared to address the 
emperor thus : 

"Sir, I can refuse nothing to your majesty, but the 
moment Bourbon quits my house I shall set fire to it 
as a place polluted by the presence of a traitor, aDd 
no longer a fit residence for men of honor!" 

And another of the emperor's subjects, our friend 
Erasmus, the giant among learned men, had the 
boldness to write : "If I were conqueror, I would thus 
speak to the conquered, the King of France, 'My 
brother, fate has made you my prisoner ; a like mis- 
fortune might have happened to me. Your defeat 
shows the fragility of all human greatness. Receive 
your freedom, become my friend; let all rivalry 
cease between us, except that of virtue. In deliver- 
ing you, I acquire more glory than if I had conquered 
France. In accepting that kindness with gratitude, 
you achieve more than if you had driven me from 
Italy.' " 

This good advice the emperor cast to the winds, 
and the old heartless diplomacy went on. 

Yes. The emperor has always been watchful of 
his independence ; he has no High Chancellor and 
no Council of State, but interests himself personally 
in Spanish affairs and in the German, Burgundian 
and foreign departments, with the two Granvilles, 
father and son, and gives frequent and long 
audiences in a most kindly manner. In spite of his 



gravity he is of popular and obliging manner, with- 
out in the least detracting from his dignity. 

jlns. But what about his many encroachments 
on the Constitution of our native country, the 
Netherlands? 

Yes. All his measures in that direction were 
passed without any opposition because the emperor 
knows how to flatter the vanity of the people. He 
spoke their language, exchanged civilities with the 
public leaders, and avoided the introduction of 
Spanish customs and Spanish etiquette, but all the 
time he was filling Brussels with Spanish soldiers. 
Still there is no doubt that the emperor is the 
greatest monarch in Christendom ! 

tins. No heart speaks from his features, but in- 
cessant reflection, gravity and severity mark them. 

Yes. It is true his clear, blue eyes appear im- 
movable, his gaze is fixed, either straight forward or 
in some other direction, never changing. He keeps 
his mouth, with its prominent underlip, a la mode 
d'Autriche, half way open, and his movements, as 
well as his way of speaking, are slow and deliberate. 

Jtitns. I am glad the dissensions of the Pope and 
Emperor prove very favorable to the progress of 
Lutheranism ; the Emperor's example has embold- 
ened the GermanB to treat the papal authority with 
little reverence. In the Emperor's published reply 
to the angry letter of Pope Clement, the Emperor 
has enumerated many instances of the Pope's deceit 
and ingratitude and has also written to the college 
of the cardinals requiring them to show their con- 
cern for the peace of the Christian church, so shame- 
fully neglected by its chief pastor. The manifesto 



of the Emperor is little inferior in virulence to the 
thunderbolts of Luther and has been eagerly read all 
over Germany, and has done much more in favor of 
Protestantism than the Emperor's declaration of 
opposition did against it. 

Yes. But, nevertheless, the Emperor is a rigid 
Catholic, although he has never shown any particular 
reverence for the person of the Pope ! 

tins. Small wonder ! The Emperor is a hypocrite 
of the highest order. Remember Rome, Master 
Vesalius ! Rome was never treated even by the bar- 
barous Huns, Vandals and Goths with as much 
cruelty as recently by the bigoted subjects of a 
Catholic monarch, the Emperor. The wretched in- 
habitants of Rome had to suffer terribly from the 
ferocity, avarice and licentiousness of the Imperial 
soldiers. Churches, palaces and private residences 
were plundered without exception, no age or sex 
was exempt from the brutality of the soldiers, cardi- 
nals, priests, nobles, matrons as well as virgins, were 
all maltreated, and for several months were the out- 
rages and indignities of the soldiers continued. 

The Pope, penned up in his uninhabitable castle 
of St. Angelo, and reduced to such extremities of 
famine as to feed on asses' flesh, had to capitulate, 
pay four hundred thousand ducats and remain a 
prisoner until other humiliating articles of peace 
were performed. 

And the Emperor? He was overjoyed by the mis- 
fortune of the Pope, but, in order to shield himself 
and allay the general indignation, declared that 
Rome had been assaulted without any order from 
him. He put himself and the court in mourning 



and commanded prayers and processions throughout 
all Spain for the recovery of the Pope's liberty, 
which, by an order to his generals, he could have im- 
mediately granted him. 

Now, Master Vesalius, was that not the grossest 
and most hypocritical of artifices? 

Yes* The Emperor's self-love and power of dis- 
simulation he inherited from his maternal grand- 
father, Ferdinand, the mental depression at times 
amounting to insanity in his mother, Johanna ; the 
nobleness of mind of his grandfather, Maximilian, 
and of his father, Philip, form the groundwork of his 
character. His unceasing labors aggravate his 
naturally not happy temperament and prevent his 
best qualities from being brought forward. 

He examines everything calmly, but with a keen, 
or even rather suspicious, look. He does not know 
passionate anger, and offences do not change his 
countenance, but they are treasured up in his bosom, 
and sometimes, after years, they are fearfully re- 
venged. 

tins. Nor does he change his countenance, either, 
when called upon to sign a death warrant, and this 
he considers befitting to majesty. 

Yes. But he never uses force until all means of 
patience and clemency have failed. The Emperor 
elicits respect at first sight and admiration on 
further acquaintance ; his power of self-control never 
fails and to win a secret from him is impossible. A 
sure indication of his greatness is that he can be 
spoken to on the subject of his faults with utmost 
freedom. 

2lns. But when it comes to measures where the 



interests of the Romish church are concerned the 
Emperor has his advisers among the clergy, on 
whom he implicitly relies. Garcia de Loyasa, the 
Emperor's confessor, and Grand Inquisitor as well, 
is one of those highest in the Emperor's confidence. 
He is his most 'intimate spiritual adviser, and I say 
his advice savors too much of a principle never ac- 
knowledged in words though often and most culpably 
put into practice, "that the end justifies the means." 
Save the confessor, nobody possesses any real in- 
fluence over the Emperor. You see, Master Vesalius, 
there are most powerful persons behind the throne, 
against whom the Emperor could hardly give you 
any protection. 

Do you know, Master Vesalius, how the old fox 
talks to the Emperor? "I wish," he says, ''that Your 
Majesty may be the means of ridding the German 
nation of the heresy which pervades it. Italy will 
exalt you as the highest and best of earthly princes. 
Do not hesitate to make any pecuniary sacrifice for 
the faith, offer up all you have carefully laid aside 
for public uses ; whatever you expend in the sacred 
cause will be repaid with usury, and not only in the 
world to come but in this also, and your stores will 
be resplenished with showers of golden ducats and 
all worldly riches." Thus the old fox writes literally 
to the Emperor. 

"And," he oontinues, "the archbishopric of Tara- 
cona is vacant. Should it occur to Your Majesty 
that any person of consideration in Germany might 
by this means bs induced to become a convert to the 
holy faith you must not hesitate to bestow it upon 
him, even should he be a stranger and living at a 



distance." Now you see, Master Vesalius, under 
what kind of influence the Emperor is. "The end 
justifies the means!" 

Ves. At all events the Emperor's confessor has 
tried his best to warn the Emperor not to indulge in 
dishes which are injurious to the health, in order to 
preserve his life for the sake of others, and he has 
told the Emperor "that his chest is sometimes heard 
further off than his tongue," as the Emperor often 
coughs more than he speaks. He has admonished 
him against gluttony, urging him to be careful in his 
diet and eat wholesome instead of highly-seasoned 
food. In this regard he is perfectly right, because 
long accustomed to strong stimulants in his diet the 
Emperor's palate has lost all its sensitiveness to 
taste. 

Small wonder is it that the other day he told the 
grandmaster of his kitchen, Monfaletto, when com- 
plaining of a dinner served up to him by the head 
cook, "that it was composed of nothing but wood." 

Besides the Emperor has always been a bad 
sleeper, and the hot climates in which he has passed 
the greater part of his life, together with the un- 
wholesomeness of his food, have contributed much 
to augment this complaint. Since forty years of age 
he has never slept more than four out of the four and 
twenty hours. 

At five o'clock in the morning a dish is brought 
to him consisting of a fowl, or capon, dressed with 
milk, sugar and spice, after which he reposes an 
hour. At twelve a dinner is served consisting of at 
least twenty dishes. 

In the evening, towards eight o'clock, he partakes 



of some anchovies or other savory fish, and he sups 
at midnight. He drinks the most heating beverages, 
and takes very little exercise except during the ex- 
citement and bustle of a campaign. 

Ans. Well, otherwise he is the greatest monarch 
of Christendom, because he understands perfectly 
how to parade as a magnificent ruler and warrior ; 
the pageant at his coronation at Bologna is the best 
proof of that. Most certainly this was a procession 
fit for a great emperor, enough to make the earth as 
well as the heavens tremble when the artillery set up 
its terrible roar. 

But that same great Emperor, when performing 
his act of submission or homage to the Pope, sank 
on his knees, kissed the foot of the Pope, and, rising, 
kissed the Pope's hand. The Pope on his part kissed 
the Emperor's cheek. This done the Emperor fell 
again on his knees, until the Pope, making a gracious 
gesture, begged him to rise. 

Then the Emperor spoke : "Holy father, thanks be 
to God above, who has conceded to me so great a 
favor, that I should arrive in safety here to kiss the 
feet of Your Holiness, and to be received with 
greater kindness than I can ever merit, and thus I 
place myself under your safeguard." 

Holy and at the same time crafty words, are they 
not, Master Vesalius ? And what a safeguard ! 

Most certainly the Emperor is remarkable for his 
graceful horsemanship, and he rides when fully 
armed with so much majesty, and manages his horse 
so gallantly, that no more accomplished knight can 
be found anywhere, but when it comes to advanced 
thought in the realm of religion the Emperor is 



the worBt kind of a bigot and a mere tool of the 
church. 

Ves. Since the Emperor firBt commenced religi- 
ous wars all his energies feave been devoted to the 
great object of putting down Protestanism, as well 
as all the princes who supported it. But there is no 
union of religious principles — frequently Roman 
Catholic being arrayed against Roman Catholic, and 
Protestant against Protestant, as a worldly policy 
might dictate. The Pope and the Emperor are 
usually at variance, and finally the Turk has been 
brought in to determine the fate of Christendom. 

The Emperor is undoubtedly a prince who is with 
all his greatness and accomplishments of a most 
modest demeanour. He is very studious of religion 
and wishes by his example to excite the fervor of 
divine worship in his Court, and, mind, friend 
Anselm, to acquire his favor there is no surer 
method than propriety of conduct and the profession 
of sincere Christianity. 

On rising in the morning he attends a private 
mass, then after granting a few audiences he pro- 
ceeds to a public mass, and immediately afterwards 
to dinner. Accordingly it has come to be the proverb 
at Court, ''D'alla messa alia mensa," from mass to 
mess. Then the Emperor eats a great deal of food 
of a kind that produces gross and viscous humors, 
whence arise his two tormenting indispositions, the 
gout and asthma. 

fins. Although the Emperor's heart and mind are 
hidden and impenetrable, he shows by his deeds 
that he is not only a bigot and a hypocrite but also 
a despot. He has been to everyone a friend and a 



foe by turns. He was at one time an enemy to the 
King of England, and afterwards he entered into an 
alliance with him. He waged unceasing war upon 
the King of France for twenty years, and ended by 
concluding a friendly treaty giving up Milan to him. 
To the Lutherans he has appeared sometimes in the 
light of a friend, and sometimes in that of an enemy. 
Of the Pope he has often said the sharpest things, 
and yet, after all was said, has done much to the 
Pope's advantage; although he attaches very little 
weight to the Pope's promises. 

Yes. But, friend Anselm, you forget that the 
Pope is to be regarded in two lights ; first, as the 
head of the Roman Catholic faith, and, secondly, as 
temporal prince. 

tins. And when the Emperor made the Pope his 
prisoner, he made not only the temporal prince his 
captive, but, with very little show of respect, im- 
prisoned the other half, too, the head of the Roman 
Catholic faith. 

Yes. And you say the Emperor is a despot? 

tins. How about the Emperor's utter contempt 
for the civil rights of the people shown early in the 
political affairs of Spain and the Netherlands, and 
the violence with which he afterwards, under the 
empire, resisted and punished all efforts to oppose 
his arbitrary will ! This certainly does not exempt 
him from the charge of despotism. (.# page enters.} 

'Page. His most gracious majesty, the Emperor, 
commands herewith his body-physician to appear 
before the Emperor for medical counsel ! 



SCENE III. 

Emperor Charles Y. and Vesalius. 

Emperor. (To page.) Where is Vesalius? {<Page 
draws Vie portiere. Vesalius enters.) I trust I 
have chosen the right man in appointing you as my 
body-physician, just as I chose the right man when 
I appointed you the chief surgeon of my Imperial 
Netherlandish army. 

Yes. Your most Gracious Majesty has bestowed a 
great honor upon me, and it has always been my 
ardent endeavor to prove myself worthy of your 
Majesty's grace. 

Emp. An immense responsibility has been placed 
upon you ! 

Yes. The greater the responsibility your Gracious 
Majesty places upon me, the greater is my desire to 
do my full duty. 

Emp. Indirectly you are responsible for the 
spiritual and mental welfare of all those subjects of 
my vast empire who worship the holy cross. It re- 
quires a strong mind not to become intoxicated by 
being the mightiest ruler of the age. All the nations 
of which I am the imperial ruler have to be balanced 
in their antagonistic political interests and tenden- 
cies — tendencies arising from their different national- 
ities. The brain of such a ruler must be of an im- 
perial nature, as it must grasp and digest the 
enormous sum total of all the manifestations of life 
of such a gigantic political body. The brain is the 
natural and legitimate ruler of the whole body, but 



even an imperial brain depends upon the stomach, 
the generator of all the vital force. Hence the 
necessity of making my stomach a paragon of excel- 
lence, an imperial stomach that will give sufficient 
strength to my arm to conquer, and sufficient wisdom 
to my brain to rule, the whole world. Just at present 
I am confined to Brussels, suffering from a severe 
attack of gout, and knowing your extraordinary 
medical skill I am confident that you will rid me of 
the burden of the gout and restore my stomach to its 
former phenomenal vigor. By achieving this you 
will enable me to go again upon the battlefield and 
crush down the Turk as well as the heretics. I think 
you realize now the far-reaching importance of your 
position as my body-physician ; restore my stomach 
to perfect health and I shall be able to secure the 
material and spiritual welfare of all my subjects, 
and all for the glory of the Almighty by whose 
grace I rule as his substitute. 

Yes. I am fully aware of the great and far-reach- 
ing responsibility of my position. 

Emp. Well, Vesalius, tell me candidly the cause 
of this renewed terrible attack of the gout. Consider 
the great fatigues I have suffered by incessant travel 
from Spain to the Netherlands, thence into Germany, 
thence crossing the Alps into Italy, then crossing 
twice the Mediterranean Sea and fighting at different 
times the most fearful battles in Africa, suffering 
untold exposure. On my return, down I went into 
Hungary to give battle to the Turk — all for the glory 
of God the Almighty by whose grace I rule my vast 
dominion. Indeed, I have suffered great and count- 
less fatigues, always considering it to be my duty to 



look personally to my affairs and be present in every 
battle, bnt I have been oftener attacked by the gout 
when trying to enjoy some rest, either in Spain or 
the Netherlands. 

Yes. Everybody knows the unceasing and untir- 
ing efforts of your Gracious Majesty to maintain the 
great power alloted to the mightiest monarch in 
Christendom, but your Majesty's ailment has only 
partly been caused by the exposure unavoidable in 
most extensive travels ; the greater part of it can be 
traced to your Majesty's cooks and butlers. 

Emp. Sir, I commanded you to be candid, but 
your language is rather bold ; if a physician talks to 
his patients the way you do, he is liable to lose their 
patronage, for patients as a rule do not like to be re- 
strained in their habits of life, nor in their hobbies. 
Be careful, you might lose the imperial protection of 
your hobby of anatomical research ! Nevertheless, I 
appreciate your frankness, knowing that it is the 
way of you physicians to starve your patients in 
order to starve their ailments. To starve the patient 
to death does not of course occasion the physician 
any discomfort; it is the patient who suffers. I 
hope, Vesalius, you will find means to repair the 
faulty parts of my system while all the machinery 
goes at full speed, and not bring my system to a 
complete standstill by starving it. I expect you will 
be able to restore to me the great physical and 
mental strength which I need to perform my im- 
perial duties, but in order to do this it requires an 
imperial digestive power with food and drink fit for 
an imperial stomach. 

Yes. Even the owner of an imperial stomach, of 



a stomach possessed of marvelous digestive powers, 
has in time to make some concessions, as all living 
beings are subject to the laws of nature. 

Emp. But I am suffering from a lawless stomach, 
and it will be your duty, Vesalius, to reduce my 
stomach to lawful obedience. 

Yes. Our stomach often appears to act lawlessly, 
while, in fact, it revolts in strict accordance with 
nature's laws, protesting against the tyranny of its 
owner ; our stomach after being ill-treated, takes its 
turn and ill-treats us. 

Emp. I have always treated my stomach royally 
to food and drink. 

Yes. Even the stomach of the mightiest Emperor 
gets sometimes out of sorts by being treated too roy- 
ally. We physicians often discover the real cause of 
the gout, and the disorders of the stomach which pre- 
cede it, in the kitchen and wine cellar of the sufferer. 

Emp. I understand ! Indeed a bold onslaught on 
the necessities and comforts of my life I It is from 
the kitchen that our thoughts derive their vital 
energy, and there is some genuine elixir of life 
bottled up in a good wine cellar I 

Yes. I am sorry to say that it is an impossibility 
to bottle up vital energy, health and spirit ; there 
are life-sustaining forces and agencies. In addition 
to fresh air, sunlight and exercise, wholesome food 
and drink are indispensable to perfect health. There 
are no life-sustaining draughts to be found bottled 
up either in the cellar or in the medicine chest. 
Even the mightiest monarch of our age, even the 
stomach of your most Gracious Majesty, is subject to 
the almighty laws of nature. 



Emp. But the stomach of the church never suffers 
from indigestion, and digests everything, even whole 
countries. Vesalius, bring my stomach up to that 
standard, to the marvelous digestive power of the 
church, and I shall consider you the unequaled mas- 
ter of medical skill and will reward you royally. 

Yes. Indeed the stomach of the church is an 
anatomical and physiological marvel, but her 
digestive power is also limited by the laws of nature ; 
consequently the church will never be able to digest 
the present religious reform movement. 

Emp. I appreciate your frankness, Vesalius, but 
at the same time I hope you realize that such bold 
language can only be uttered by a man who is under 
the protection of an imperial patron. There is more 
state business in that so-called religious reform 
movement than in anything else, and I shall con- 
sider anybody touching upon that subject an intruder 
of that legitimate sphere alloted to me by the Lord 
Almighty. It is this very epidemic of the rankest 
hereticism that makes an iron stomach an indis- 
pensable affair to me, for it was but a slight indiges- 
tion, lowering the vitality of my brain, that caused 
me to make that fatal mistake of not cremating that 
bold and fanatical monk, Luther. What a change of 
the world's theatre would have been brought about 
by extinguishing that German firebrand of hereticism 
at the start, before that spark emanating from his 
rebellious mind kindled a wildfire of religious and 
political discord. Fomented by political intrigue 
and the stubborn ambition and greediness of some 
German princes, this religious discord has caused 
the spiritual and political disruption of my vast 



empire. Well, Vesaliua, what is your definite 
opinion as regards my failing health ? 

Ves. I warn your most Gracious Majesty to put 
the brakes to your Majesty's glorious triumphal 
chariot, for if it continues to dash along with such 
marvelous and phenomenal speed, without any re- 
straint, it will have to be dismantled and overhauled, 
or it will come to a stop with a sudden crash. 

Emp. Has my life really reached such an ominous 
stage ? Your advice cuts to the quick all my lofty 
and ambitious schemes. Vesalius, I cannot heed 
your advice. Such advice may be most proper for 
one of my subjects, but it does not hold good for the 
ruler of a dominion in which the sun never sets, nor 
can such an advice apply to a war-lord whose office 
it is to take the lead on the battlefield. I know you 
mean well, but to heed your advice means the abdica- 
tion of a mighty emperor or slow suicide. 

I, the ruler of the vastest dominion of the age, and 
the acknowledged hero of many battlefields, cannot 
afford to linger to death or to be starved ; my portion 
is to die on the battlefield or to die of old age. What 
I want you to do is to compound a wonderful elixir 
of life to whip up my flagging vitality or prescribe 
for me an arcanum to kill the demon of the gout that 
tortures me day aDd night; break the shackles with 
which the gout has fettered my stiffened and swollen 
limbs and give me a chance to move forward, for I 
have war to wage on the stubborn German princes 
with their rank heresy and deep political intrigues. 

I am anxious to learn what your colleague, my 
other body-physician, will have to say! He has 
given me his medical advice for a great many years. 



His opinion, of course, will differ from yours, as it 
is the case with you physcians that one gets as many 
different opinions as physcians he consults. Thii is 
where the complication of my ailment comes in. I 
am suffering from the gout and in addition from two 
body-physicians. One of them tries to cure my ail- 
ment by starving my system, while the other one 
feeds me well enough to keep my gout in good 
condition. 

Well, to extricate myself from that dilemma, I 
shall have to be my own body-physician ! Sufferers 
want to get well and do not care about medical doc- 
trines or about the method by which they are cured. 

I think I will once more resort to my other two 
well-tried body-physicians, to my cook and my 
butler. Down in the cellar sparkles the unequaled 
elixir of life that will cause the mainspring of life, 
the heart, to work with all its might to overcome the 
obstruction and agony caused by the gout. 

Where there is a will there is a way, and where 
there is the will of a mighty emperor there are plenty 
of ways ! 

Vesalius, I am going to wage war on Germany ! 
In the turmoil of battle I shall forget all about my 
gout. {Exit Vesalius). 

The destiny of the nations over which I rule shall 
not suffer by my personal affliction. 

I feel already some of the fiery current of my former 
strength and energy coursing through my veins ! 

On then ! I go to wage war on Germany, the hot- 
bed of heresy, and to humiliate those stubborn Ger- 
man princes. In the hum of the battlefield I shall 
forget all about my ailments. 



SCENE IV. 

Castle at (Rudolsladl, Germany. Countess Kalh- 

arina and Caspar Aquila; Later <Dule 

d'Alva and His Suite. 

Countess KaViarina. I have sent for you Aquila, 
your life is in great danger. The Duke d'Alva is 
expected here at any moment ; he has sent word that 
he and his suite would like to take luncheon at my 
castle. Who would dare to refuse the duke's request 
at a time when my domain is swarming with Spanish 
troops ! But I have secured a letter of protection 
from the Emperor; my subjects need protection; 
but you know very well, Aquila, that you do not 
come in for that protection, as the terrible Duke 
d'Alva has set a reward of five thousand florins upon 
your head because of your recent sermon against the 
Emperor's interim. I must give you protection in 
some other way. Here is a basket filled with pro- 
visions ; go to the well room and let yourself down 
by the chain to the water's edge. There you will 
find in the masonry of the wall a niche leading to a 
small dungeon, the existence of which is not known 
to anybody but me. Make haste, before it is too 
late ! Hark I There, already, is the trumpet blast 
of the herald, and they are just about to lower the 
drawbridge ; the worst enemies of the Lutherans 
have arrived. Aquila, do not lose your head now, 
otherwise you are sure to lose it tomorrow by a mere 
nod of the great executioner of the Blood-Tribunal, 
the Duke d' Alva. {Exit Aquila.) 



Countess. How glad I am to have secured a letter 
of protection from the Emperor. This time my sub- 
jects will not have to suffer in any way from the 
Spanish soldier hordes, who are intoxicated from 
their victorious battles and greed for plunder. It is 
true, I had to promise bread and beer and other pro- 
visions for the soldiers marching over the bridge, 
but I have taken the precautionary measure of having 
the wooden bridge that spans the river removed, and 
have had it reconstructed further up the river, at a 
greater distance from the town, because I fear those 
rapacious soldiers at the sight of the town and castle 
would not be able to resist their greed. What a 
comfort it will be for the inhabitants of all those 
villages through which that tremendous column of 
the imperial army is going to march, that all the 
chattels of those peasants have been stowed away in 
the cellars and sub-cellars of my castle ! 

Duke d' Alva, that champion of religious bigotry 
and fanaticism, has requested, through his messenger, 
to be allowed to take his luncheon at my castle ! 
Well, I know the meaning of such a request when it 
comes from the worst enemy of our cause ! Mercy 
upon Aquila if he runs across that butcher ! 

The duke has received my answer, that I will give 
all that my larder affords, but I have not missed the 
opportunity of reminding him of the Emperor's 
letter of protection and of entreating him to faith- 
fully live up to the provisions of that letter ! 

{The loud din of arms is heard). 

Here they come ! 

{Duke d' lllva, <Duke de Brunswick and his sons, 
with the rest of Ihe suite, enter the banquet hall). 



Welcome, your excellencies, welcome gentlemen, 
make yourselves comfortable, and pray be satisfied 
with the trifle I am able to offer such illustrious 
guests. 

(M sit down at the table and lake luncheon). 

<Duke d' vllva. It gives me much pleasure to 
tender my best respects and thanks to our gracious 
hostess for the kind reception and the sumptuously 
spread table, proving that the ladies of Thuringia 
keep a good table and uphold the noble custom of 
hospitality. 

(.# servant approaches the countess and delivers 
a message; the countess, excusing herself , leaves the 
banquet hall, saying that she will be back in a 
minute). 

Duke d 1 £lva. Our hostess has made a wonderful 
move in securing a letter of protection from the 
Emperor. Our soldiers ought to be excused for 
some marauding, their pay is due for some months 
and a little sacking w^uld have comforted the boys. 
There is at best not much booty to be had in poor 
Thuringia! Of course it is more than likely that 
my soldiers would have burned down this nest of 
new believers. I bet Aquila, that arch-heretic, is 
somewhere hidden in this castle, but, by God, if he 
is caught this time the gunpowder will be dry 
enough to blow him to atoms ! I know he is under 
the protection of the Countess Katharina, for, what 
perhaps you gentlemen don't know, the countess her- 
self is an arch-heretic. She favors and assists the 
new believers among her subjects. She tries her best 
to do away with the monkhood, and to improve the 
schools, and to give shelter and assistance to all the 



protestant preachers who are under prosecution for 
their new belief. As soon as she returns I am going 
to frighten her by asking her about the whereabouts 
of the preacher, Caspar Aquila! 

( The countess enters the banquet hall). 

Duke d' tflva. Well, your ladyship, have you 
been looking out to see if Caspar Aquila is still 
under good shelter and his head still between his 
shoulders ? 

Countess* No, Duke d' Alva, but I have just re- 
ceived word of how little the Emperor's letter of pro- 
tection is respected. Your Spanish soldiers have 
committed violence in many of the villages and have 
stolen the cattle of the peasants. I feel towards my 
subjects like a mother; if they have been wronged, 
I feel as though I myself had been wronged. Duke, 
I beg you urgently to remedy the wroog that has 
been done to my subjects. 

Duke oV tf.lv a. Such is the custom in time of war, 
and such little accidents cannot be avoided when an 
army is marching through a land, be it a kingdom 
or a mere county. 

Countess Duke, I shall see what is to be done; 
my poor subjects shall have what is due them, or, by 
God, I shall demand the blood of the princes in ex- 
change for ox-blood. 

{She departs. Upon her departure, armed men 
crowd into the banquet hall, and, sword in hand, 
place themselves respectfully behind the chairs of 
the guests, to wail upon them, tfl the sight of 
those sturdy fellows, ready for action, Duke 
d' tflva' s looks change, and the guests look per- 
plexedly at one another). 



Duke of Brunswick. (Turning to one of the 
armed men.) What is the meaning of all this? 

The Servant. All the servants have been armed 
at a minute's notice, all the exits of the castle have 
been bolted and locked, the drawbridge has been 
raised ; you are cut off fig m the imperial army and 
surrounded by strong war-proof men. 

Duke of Brunswick. Tell her ladyship, the 
Countess, that we should be very much pleased to 
see her. 

{Exit servant, the Countess re-enters the banquet 
hall). 

Duke of Brunswick. (Laughing outright). In- 
deed a delightful joke of your ladyship to scare us to 
death ! You have sumptuously regaled us, and the 
motherly care you take of your subjects is admirable I 
Your daring determination is above praise ! Dear 
Countess, let me manage affairs, Duke d' Alva does 
not sufficiently understand our language. I will ex- 
plain to him in Spanish and see to it that he com- 
plies with your wishes. Here is paper and ink and 
pen and I am going to put down that the cattle that 
have been pilfered by the Spanish soldiers are im- 
mediately to be given back to the peasants. 

(He speaks a few words in Spanish to the Duke 
d' Alva and the latter signs the paper). 

Duke of Brunswick. (Handing the paper to the 
Countess). Many thanks! 

( The guests lake leave, shaking hands courteously 
with the Countess). 



SCENE V. 
Monologue of Charles V. 

A slight tremor possesses my system, like to the 
tremble of the royal oak when the keen steel of the 
ax is laid at its main roots. 

I feel my advancing years, the gout unstrings my 
nerves, and the asthma chokes up the channels that 
carry fresh air — the elixir of life— to the blood. 

Formerly, how I did abound with vigor! How 
briskly coursed my life-blood through its channels; 
neither my musoles, hard as steel, nor my nerves, 
knew weariness or pain 1 

Formerly, thoughts, keen and plentiful, flashed 
through my brain, and, as soon as they presented 
themselves, were grasped with determination, and 
my strong arm was ready to turn my resolves into 
action, while, now, my thoughts, mere shadows, flit 
like spectres through my brain. 

And alas! at the present time I must rely upon 
myself alone ; formerly the most valiant armies and 
the most courageous and experienced generals were 
at my disposal, sufficient to conquer the whole world 1 
Now I am forsaken, and lack strength and might, 
and the sinews of war, money! 

Formerly, my brain was weaving by day and by 
night a web of the finest diplomatic fabric, and 
through all that fabric ran a thread of that magnifi- 
cent imperial purple, marking its maker, Emperor 
Charles V. 

At present that magnificent imperial purple looks 
like the sombre shroud of death! 



In the German diet at Worms, at a time when that 
imperial pnrple shone in its highest splendor, I 
ridiculed that pale friar, Martin Lnther, remarking 
to my neighbor : "That monk conld not convert me 
into a heretic!" And at present the whole world 
trembles at the following of that pale monk, and 
even my throne begins to shake. 

Through a sea of blood I waded until I realized 
that ideas are more powerful than swords. It is the 
muscle that wields the sword, and it is the nerve 
that sets the muscle to work, but it is the idea that 
vitalizes and quickens and steels the nerve. 

I tried to ©radicate all heretical notions from the 
brains of my subjects, I tried to imprison those new- 
fangled ideas. Alas! you can jail a man's body, 
but not his ideas! It would be a splendid task for 
Vesalius' scalpel, which he wields so cleverly, to 
locate the very spot in the human brain where 
heretical ideas first take root ! If once we know the 
nests where suoh ideas are hatched, we might be able 
to kill them before they become full-fledged and soar 
abroad like birds on the wing. 

But they do not remain on the wing, they nest in 
the brains of other people and breed and multiply 
again and again. 

As the wily cuckoo smuggles his eggs into the 
nests of other birds to be hatched, in order that the 
young cuckoos as soon as they slip out of their shells 
may devour the legitimate offspring of the nest, just 
so the new illegitimate ideas swallow up the old 
legitimate and privileged ideas. 

In spite of my long, glorious rule, in spite of the 
tremendous manifestations of power of every descrip- 



tion, I must admit that I have not gained any lasting 
success as regards the Protestants and the Turk ; the 
"new faith" has proved to be stronger than the 
mighty and powerful ruler of an empire within the 
boundaries of which the sun never sets. This sad 
disappointment distresses my mind and makes me 
realize to what a degree I have been humiliated ; the 
little monk Luther has most fiercely avenged himself 
upon me ! 

I made a fatal mistake in not treading under foot 
like a weed the first upshoot of the reformatory 
movement, by putting Luther at the stake. Now 
that suckling of the "new faith" grows into a tree, a 
Upas tree, the rank effluvia of which endangers the 
whole Catholic world. 

It was another fatal mistake that I did not keep 
King Francis a prisoner ; if I had dsne this I should 
have been able to concentrate all my strength and 
smite the Turk, the arch-fiend of Christendom. 

Though I have spent millions, and waded through 
a sea of blood, waging war against the King of 
France for twenty years, in spite of the most intricate 
diplomatic skill and artifice the King of France re- 
mains unhumiliated. Moreover, there is a shadow 
standing out on the horizon of the future, the 
silhouette of his son, the Dauphin of France, who I 
am afraid will in the future possess more power than 
my son Philip. And with this very thought I carry 
to the grave all my hopes for the future welfare of 
the empire and of my son. 

Indeed, I am the one who has been humiliated — I, 
the ruler of half the world, I, who have developed 
and improved the monarchical idea to its greatest 



might, I, who have surrounded the monarchial govern- 
ment with imperial splendor and overawed my sub- 
jects with its unheard of magnificence! 

The sinister lot has fallen to me, that, in spite of 
my almost unlimited power, I have suffered a moral 
defeat from which I shall never recover. 

I have vanquished and even annihilated the armies 
of my enemies; but after every victorious battle 
there has remained one invincible enemy, whose 
power I had underestimated, the "new faith," which 
has stirred the minds of my subjects to the depth 
of their souls. 

No other ruler can boast of such a long, glorious 
and eventful reign ! And still it is my fate to abdi- 
cate as the Romish Emperor of Germany. I must 
resign! Sic transit gloria mundi. 



SCENE VI. 



Piazza at 'Brussels. Abdication of Charles V. 
Sumptuous (Display of Splendor. 

Emperor. I, the mightiest prince of Christendom, 
descend of my own free will from the first throne of 
the world. If my death had put you, my son Philip, 
into the possession of the sovereignty, I should be 
entitled to receive your thanks for such a precious 
inheritance, but in voluntarily transferring the rule 
of the Netherlands, because I wish to prepare myself 
for my demise, I demand of you that you reward 
your subjects for what you owe me. Other rulers 

163 



feel happy in bequeathing their heir apparent the 
crown death takes from their head, while I will live 
and see you rule ; few princes have done as I do, few 
will follow my example. I hope your course will 
justify my confidence and that you will rule with 
wisdom, and remain unshaken in the true faith, the 
strongest foundation of your throne. 

{King Philip kneels down in front of the Em- 
peror, pressing his face upon the Emperor's hand, 
and receives Ihe lallefs Messing. He and all the 
bystanders are in tears. The crowd disperses. 
Vesalius and vlnselm remain). 

Sins. Was not that abdication a magnificent farce? 
It is an old trick with rulers to first appeal to the 
lachrymal glands of their subjects and afterwards to 
their purses. 

Yes. Statecraft, statecraft, dear friend Anselm. 

Sins. (In a whisper.) Dear Master Vesalius, 
never trust that old fox, the Emperor ! As all the 
Emperor's recent schemes of policy and conquest 
have ended in nothing but disaster and disgrace, he 
abdicates. 

The Pope, the Turk, the King of France and the 
Protestant princes of the empire were once more 
arrayed against the Emperor, who formerly had im- 
posed laws upon them all. The finances of Spain 
and of the other dominions of Austria are in a very 
bad shape, and the Emperor, the lord of Mexico and 
Peru, has been forced to beg a loan from the Duke of 
Florence, and the Protestant faith is spreading itself 
even in the dominions of the orthodox house of 
Hapsburg. No wonder the Emperor seized the op- 
portunity to make for the long desired abode of 



refuge. I am glad that he retires to the backwoods 
of I^stramadura. 

Yes. The Emperor's flight from Innsbruck, under 
the most trying circumstances, does not disgrace the 
Emperor. When Maurice, the Elector of Saxony, 
raised to his high station by the Emperor, turned 
traitor to the latter's cause, the Emperor was in a 
terrible plight; in fact, I think it was the most 
tragic event that ever fell to the lot of that great and 
mighty ruler. Without an army, without any friends, 
without financial means, and crippled by his ail- 
ments, the gout and the asthma, he had to be carried 
in a horse-litter on a dark and most tempestuous 
night on sumpter paths along the most fearful pre- 
cipices and through the deep and tortuous ravines of 
the Tyrolean Alps. Valets with torches went along 
to show the cavalcade through that labyrinth of 
gorges and mountains. 

tins. I think it was but a just punishment, for 
the Emperor believed he had in the battle of Muhl- 
berg crushed down the cause of the Protestants, and 
he was assisted by the Elector of Saxony, indeed one 
of the cleverest and most courageous champions of 
Protestantism. But afterwards that young cunning 
fox served the old cunning fox, the Emperor, with 
his own tricks, trying, as he said, "to catch the old 
fox in his own burrow, Innsbruck." 

Yes. But the Elector had to acknowledge "that 
he had no cage for such a bird;" but he did not need 
one as the imperial bird escaped. 

tins. But the Elector Maurice demanded from 
the Emperor, the latter being in a bad plight, religi- 
ous peace to be established by special treaty, and he 



got it ; thus the Emperor for the first time had the 
experience of realizing that religious toleration and 
many other concessions had been wrested from him. 

Yes. In the battle of Muhlberg the Emperor 
fought and subdued the Protestant princes not as 
Protestants but as rebels. You ought to have seen, 
friend Anselm, how the Emperor, in a magnificent 
accoutrement, elated and with the air of a victorious 
hero, galloped along his soldiers, greatly outnum- 
bered by the enemy. His gilded helmet and his 
gilded armor glittered in the light of the rising sun, 
he carried in one hand a lance and with the other he 
worked his fierce and spirited Andalusian charger. 
His richly embroidered scarf and his crimson 
shabrack shone magnificently afar off, and he him- 
self, elated with the hope of victory, seemed to defy 
all his ailments. 

?lns< But the Emperor was strapped to his horse ! 

Yes. Friend Anselm, where did you learn this? 
I admit the fact; the Emperor was at that time suf- 
fering terribly from the gout. 

You must admit, friend Anselm, that the Emperor 
often stayed the hands of the zealots of the church, 
and did he not set a fine example after the victorious 
battle of Muhlberg, when he, the victor, entered 
Wittenberg and was urged to have the remains of 
Luther disinterred? "I contend with the living not 
with the dead," he said. 

tins. If Luther had been still aHve he would have 
fared badly, as the Emperor would have made it hot 
for him at the stake. It was nothing but stage play 
by the Emperor, because he knew it was no use to 
contend with the bones of the dead. 



At present the Emperor is about to exchange the 
honors and cares of the throne for the religious 
seclusion of the cloister of Yusta, and he has pre- 
pared himself for that life of piety and repose by 
suggesting to his son Philip that he break his troth 
with the Infanta Mary of Portugal, the only child of 
the Emperor's most beautiful and favorite sister, 
Eleanor, and marry Mary Tudor who has inherited 
the crown of England. From her the Emperor got 
an early hint of her gracious willingness to become 
his second empress, but he transferred her hand to 
his son Philip. Does this not show that the Emperor 
is a cunning old fox? 

Ves. Politics, politics, dear friend Anselm ! 

?lns. The Infanta Mary of Portugal had already 
suffered, when the Emperor was still a mere lad, be- 
cause he drove her first love, Frederic Prince Pala- 
tine, from his court. Then the Emperor compelled 
her to marry Emanuel the Great, old and tottering 
on the brink of the grave ; two years afterwards she 
became a widow ; then the Emperor used her hand 
as a bait to flatter the hopes of the traitor Constable 
de Bourbon ; next he used her as a means of obtain- 
ing the alliance of his captive, the King of France, 
and a most unhappy marriage resulted, as the King 
of France never forgot that he had signed the mar- 
riage contract in prison, and speedily forsook his 
new wife for the sake of mistresses new and old. 

And the last act of the Emperor's brotherly love 
was, as I say, to instigate his own son to break his 
troth with the only daughter of the Emperor's 
favorite sister ! Such is the honesty and sincerity 
©f the Emperor! 



His wisdom is great, indeed, because he committed 
our native country, the unfortunate Netherlands, to 
his other sister, a real amazon, who succeeded well 
in suppressing the Anabaptists and Lutherans. 

Small wonder 1 a woman with an iron frame and 
an intrepid spirit, she had the hammer fist of her 
Polish ancestors, being able to drive with her fist a 
nail into a board ; hunting and hawking were her 
delight; with unerring aim she brought down a deer, 
and, tuckiog up her sleeves and drawing her knife, 
she cut the animal's throat and ripped up its belly- 
in as good a style as the best of the royal foresters. 
Sometimes hunting all night, she once galloped into 
Spa far ahead of her suite, although it was her tenth 
day in the saddle 1 

When the Emperor told the weeping crowd, "I, the 
first prince of Christendom, descend of my own free 
will forever from the first throne of the world," I 
could not help smiling, for at the same time that he, 
the most ambitious of princes, at fifty-six, descends 
from the throne, to turn monk and prepare for his 
grave, the most studious and ascetic of monks, 
CarafTa, becomes the most splendid and restless 
sovereign of Europe, being elected Pope at eighty, 
who pours forth against Spain torrents of the foulest 
abuse, denouncing the Spanish portion of his Chris- 
tian flock as "heretics, schismatics, accursed of God, 
the spawn of Jews and Moors, the offscouring of the 
earth." 

And what about KiDg Philip, Master Vesalius, 
what can you expect from him? (7/z a whisper). 

King Philip is dull, cruel and bigoted ; his policy 
is timid and procrastinating, because he is fettered 



by blind bigotry ; small wonder, because he inherited 
iiis church predilections from his father. He is pre- 
eminently the friend of the friars; in his wretched 
cell adjoining the church of the Escurial he has 
lived the life of the severest asceticism. Ever reck- 
less of the blood of the people, he is often to be seen 
on his knees, reverently dusting and polishing the 
golden reliquaries in which he has enshrined the 
bones of his saints. 

Master Vesalius, it is a dangerous time, because 
Spain herself feels the shock of the moral earthquake 
of the religious reform movement in Germany, 
France, Italy and in England, more than that of the 
great Lisbon earthquake, and there is great fear that 
Spain may go astray aDd plunge into the howling 
wilderness of heresy and schism. Not only laymen, 
but even friars, priests and dignitaries of the church, 
have made solemn protest against the vices of the 
various orders of the priesthood, against the avarice 
and the dissolute lives of the monks, against oppres- 
sive prelates who are in open concubinage and heap 
preferment upon their bastards, and even against 
Rome itself, where all the iniquities are practised on 
an imperial scale and whence Europe is irrigated 
with ecclesiastical pollution. 

Those who denounce such monstrous and crying 
evils enjoy for a while even the good will of the 
secular power; even the Inquisition itself is no 
enemy to such reforms, as its chief business up till 
now has been to keep the Jews and the Moors under 
the yoke of enforced Christianity, but at present 
where the Spanish pens are busy at translating the 
scriptures, and the translations are extensively cir- 



culated, the Inquisition has issued fresh laws, and 
enforces them with severity. 

Yes. By dedicating my next publication to the 
king, I have hardly anything to fear ! 

Sins. The New Testamant translated by Eminas 
and printed at Antwerp and dedicated to the Em- 
peror was sufficient to send the poor author, in spite 
of his judicious choice of a patron, to prison at 
Brussels as a heretical perverter of the original text. 

But at present such books and forbidden tracts are 
smuggled in bales by the muleteers over the moun- 
tains from Huguenot, Switzerland, or in casks by 
English and Dutch traders, but the chiefs of the 
black garrison seeing at once the full extent of their 
danger, at present the carnage is terrible. 

And, Master Vesalius, don't forget King Philip is 
still more friendly to the Jesuits than is the Em- 
peror. 

Yes. The new confessor of the Emperor, 
Juan de Regla, with a good deal of rancor openly 
spoke of the Jesuits as an apt instrument of satan. 

sins. But the Emperor's prejudices were over- 
come and the feelings toward the Jesuits are now 
friendly, just as are those of the vehement old 
Pope, who at the start frowned on the order of the 
Jesuits as a thing of Spain and perdition; three 
hours of discourse with some of the ablest and most 
practised champions of Jesuitism had some effect 
upon the Emperor's mind, for the mighty ruler, slow 
to be convinced and hating any innovation, had 
fought for forty years a losing battle with the ter- 
rible monk of Saxony, Luther. 

In spite of the torturing racks and in spite of the 



flaming stakes the new faith has spread in Spain, 
and it might have spread even more generally had 
not the Jesuits appeared on the scene. 

If you would only look over the rules that Loyola 
has laid down in his "regimen militaris ecclesiae," 
they are the quintessence of craft from a most subtle 
mind. All the rules are quite monarchical, and they 
establish many ranks or degrees, as among the 
soldiers. 

While the primary object of almost all the mon- 
astic orders is to separate men from the world and 
its affairs, the Jesuits on the contrary mingle in all 
transactions of the world. They are chosen soldiers 
in the service of God, and of the Pope, his vicar on 
earth. They are exempted from all those functions 
and tedious offices, the performance of which is the 
principal business of the monks, and a spirit of ac- 
tion and intrigue is infused into all the members of 
the Jesuit order. Their practical aim is to gain in- 
fluence in public and political affairs. The govern- 
ment of this order is, as I said, purely monarchical, 
their general possesses supreme power extending to 
every member, and to every case, and he can employ 
any member in whatsoever service he pleases. Under 
his directions they are mere passive instruments, 
like clay in the hands of the potter, or like dead car- 
casses incapable of resistance; they have to resign 
to their general the inclinations of their own free 
will. The aspirants have to go through a long train- 
ing and a most careful examination of their endow- 
ments in order to ascertain what they are fit for. 
The craftiest, and otherwise best fitted, are ordered 
to courts of all sovereigns as confessional fathers and 

171 



as tutors of the princes, while the best scholars get 
positions at colleges and universities or serve their 
order as writers. The most enthusiastic are sent to 
foreign lands as missionaries. 

Their manifold attainments and their apparent 
unselfishness make them liked by the people, who 
consider it a godsend that so many clever men offer 
their services without being asked, and teach the 
people without asking any remuneration. But there 
are other members of the order who are untiring in 
gathering riches in the way of bequests, legacies, 
donations and by trade transactions of their mission- 
aries. 

As confessors and tutors of the sovereigns they 
wield a most powerful influence, and they are ex- 
tremely powerful and efficient in fighting the religi- 
ous reform movement, especially in fighting the 
protestants in the interest of the Holy See. 

"Back, back into the fold of the Romish Church" 
is their shibboleth, and their efficient though con- 
demnable means to accomplish that end are trickery, 
intrigue and slander. 

Yes. Indeed that means a most formidable body 
arrayed against our cause. 

tins. {In a whisper.) Master Vesalius, the 
Jesuits are even more effective than the Inquisition ! 
I warn you do not accept the offer of the position as 
body physician of King Philip ; this is my second 
warning ! {Exit Anselm. ) 

( Vesalius stands with arms entwined, lost in 
thought.) 



ACT V. 

SCENE I. 
Madrid, Yesalius' Library. Yesalius and Anselm. 

tins. Mind, Master Vesalius, the Emperor still 
rules, that is to say, from his grave. His trembling 
hand affixed the last stamp of authority, charging 
his son Philip by his love and for his salvation "to 
take care that the heretics were repressed and chas- 
tised with all publicity and rigor, without respect to 
persons and without regard to any plea in their 
favor." And then, in a dying condition, he said, 
*'Ya, voy, Senorl" and with his eyes fixed on the 
cross he cried with a loud voice, "Ay Jesus I " and 
expired. 

And just before, this pious monarch attired himself 
in sable weeds, and bearing a taper saw himself in- 
terred, celebrating his own obsequies; the funeral 
rites ended, the Emperor dined in his alcove. 

Yes. I was in full hope, because in the spring of 
1558 the Emperor's health was fairly restored. 

tins* Small wonder, Master Vesalius, because he 
had left off his sarsaparilla and licorice water. 

The syrup-vinegar and manna which the doctors 
had allowed him seemed to aggravate rather than 
allay and they were obliged to allow him nine ounces 
of his favorite beer, which he drank eagerly and 
with apparent relish. 

Yes. But the Emperor's dinner had as usual be- 
gun with a large dish of cherries and strawberries 



smothered in cream and sugar; then ke ate some 
highly seasoned pastry, and next the principal dish 
of his repast were some rashers of bacon, as the Em- 
peror was yerj fond of the staple product of bacon 
cured in Estremadura. 

The brighter a light the more conspicuous are 
flaws. The vast extent of his dominions in Europe, 
the wealth of his Transatlantic empire, the energy of 
his character, the sagacity of his mind, have made 
him the most famous monarch of our time, and men 
of the sword found him a bold cavalier. 

Ans. Indeed a cavalier between the days of 
chivalry and the days of thinking and printing ! 

Ves. Even those men whose weapons were their 
tongues or their pens soon learnt that he was an 
astute and consummate politician. 

In the prosecution of his plans and the mainte- 
nance of his power he shrank at no labor of mind or 
fatigue of the body. From Vienna to Cadiz, from 
the low countries to Italy, any unjust steward of the 
house of Austria was sure to see his misdeeds de- 
tected on the spot by the keen, cold eye of the inde- 
fatigable Emperor, and the Emperor's fame as a 
lover and patron of art stcod as high at Antwerp and 
Toledo as at Venice and Nuremberg. 

jlns. Francis, King of France, was the amiable 
King of scholarship and gallantry, the Emperor 
Charles of statecraft and cunning. 

Ves. No doubt King Francis was oftener to be 
seen glittering in armour and at the head of the 
pageants of royalty, while the Emperor Charles was 
oftener in the trench and the fiild, donned with his 
battered mail and shabby accoutrements. And even 



in "lis ]ast campaign in Saxony, the cream-colored 
genet of the Emperor was ever in the van of battle. 

Sins. Master Vesalius, you say the Emperor was 
the greatest monarch of our time, but in his will he 
says : "Let my sepulture be so ordered that the 
lower half of my body lie beneath, and the upper 
half before the high altar, that the priest who says 
mass may tread upon my head and my breast." But 
the clergy considered his corpse possessed of enough 
sanctity, so his coffin was allowed to encroach only 
on a small portion of the holy ground. 

Yes. During the whole reign of the Emperor two 
opposing forces contended with each other — the 
trend of free inquiry on the one hand and on the 
other superstition and unreasoning conformity, rep- 
resented by the church, and these great forces were 
personified in Luther and the Emperor. We have to 
contend with the prohibition of inquiry — we do not 
rely on legendary traditions, we do not believe in the 
idolatry of relics, the innovation of saints, the ador- 
ation of the Virgin Mary and in the merit attributed 
to voluntary sufferings. 

On the throne the Emperor had not been by any 
means a religious fanatic, he confronted the Pope as 
boldly as King Francis, and held Pope Clemens, the 
Seventh, prisoner at Rome ; the Protestants he fought 
rather as rebels than as heretics; but once within 
the walls of the cloister Yuste he assumed all pas- 
sions, prejudices and superstitions of the monks. 

Reviewing his past life he thanked God for the 
evils he had been permitted to do in the matter of 
religious persecution, and in sackcloth and ashes he 
repented for having kept his plighted word to a 



heretic, to Luther, instead of cremating him at the 
stake. Religion paralyzed the strong will of the 
Emperor and his keen intellect fell grovelling in 
the dust. 

tins* During his reign the Emperor only showed 
tolerance where he did not feel strong enough to put 
down heterodoxy, but whenever he dared he was as 
fierce a persecutor as he wished ; his "faith" led him 
to ferocious cruelties in the low countries and in 
Spain. The consequences of his measures were even 
worse than torture, because they kept permanently 
the most energetic nations in darkness and semi- 
barbarism. Thus "this great monarch" has virtually 
done more harm than good. 

Ves. Immersed as he was in politics and in wars, 
ruling and even administering great and dissimilar 
kingdoms, surrounded by enemies both foreign and 
domestic, managing the home office and the foreign 
affairs of Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy, 
providing and commanding their armies and their 
fleets, yet his principal business, which engrossed 
the most of his attention, was the working out of his 
own salvation. He was one of the ablest men of his 
age, indeed of any age. But he was afraid of inquiry 
into an erroneous doctrine, because he feared heresy 
might be implanted in him by discussion, and he 
considered an erroneous doctrine to be an injury to 
God and to man, a crime and a sin to be punished by 
a cruel death here and by eternal misery hereafter. 

tins "Therefore," he said, betraying his inner- 
most nature, "the heretics must be burnt — not to 
burn them would be to incur the sin which I in- 
curred when I suffered Luther to escape. I did not 



put him to death, because I would not violate the 
promise I had given and the safe conduct of which I 
had assured him. But I waB wrong. I had no right 
to forgive a crime against God. It was my duty 
without any regard to my promise to revenge the 
injury which his heresy had inflicted on God. I 
should have cut short his progress. It is very dan- 
gerous to talk with those heretics ; they deceive you 
by their subtle and studied reasoningB. Therefore, I 
never would enter into any discussion with them." 

"Therefore," he added, "I introduced the Inquisi- 
tion in the low countries in order to check the here- 
sies that were imported from Germany, England, 
France and Switzerland. I had a decree issued that 
all persons, whatever their station, guilty of the 
opinions mentioned therein, should be burnt and 
their properties confiscated, that spies should be ap- 
pointed to discover the guilty and denounce them to 
the courts in order that the obstinate might be burnt 
alive and the repentant beheaded." All which was 
done, and the Grand Inquisitor Vasquez, answering 
for the severity of the Inquisition, stated that as it 
was the cause of God he hoped for divine assistance. 

At present, Master Vesalius, it is even dangerous 
to inquire into the mysteries of the holy office. 
There they know why in Spain alone 20,000 heretics 
have been burnt and 90,000 people banished ; why, 
they make their own laws, and there only they know 
the nature and the amount of the evidence that is 
required and what doctrines are punishable by death 
or by perpetual imprisonment or by exile or by con- 
fiscation. 

I have learned this much — that your anatomical 



publications are also registered in the famous cata- 
logue of prohibited books, as they have incurred the 
ill will of the Great Inquisitor Valdes. 

Ves. Since the Emperor's sojourn in the cloister 
Yuste, seeking solitude and repose, the disasters of 
the vessel of state have greatly outnumbered and out- 
weighed the successes and the Emperor dreads the 
arrival of every courier, and the dispatches announc- 
ing the destruction of the army of Oran lay unread 
on his table at the time of his death. 

fins. Master Vesalius, the Jesuit politicians have 
gained the ear not only of King Philip and the pre- 
lates, but of nearly all the other princes who had 
hitherto regarded the society of the Jesuits with 
coldness or even with enmity, and they speak through 
publications in every language of Europe. The dis- 
cipline and precision of that intellectual machine is 
perfect, and it moves with unanimity, by the will of 
the general of those soldiers of religion. 

Don't forget, Master Vesalius, that when the Arch- 
bishop of Carranza went from the cloister Yuste to 
Toledo, his enemy, the Grand Inquisitor Valdes, left 
no stone unturned to establish a case of heresy 
against him. Remember, Carranza had published a 
book at Antwerp, a catechism of Christianity, in 
which he reprobated heresy with the fiercest spirit of 
intolerant Romanism; he condemned the Bible if 
printed in a vulgar tongue ; praised Spain as the one 
land where the fountain of truth was still unpol- 
luted, and in his dedication ts King Philip exhorted 
him to further precautions and extolled Mary Tudor 
as the saviour of the soul of England. And yet the 
Inquisitor has contrived to find material sufficient to 



ruin the Archbishop Carranza. The rack, which so 
often agonized its victims into the wildest accusa- 
tions against themselves, easily obtained a large 
mass of evidence against Carranza from heretics who 
pretended that he was the author or the accomplice 
of their sins against the true faith. Hope or fear 
brought also many voluntary denouncers to the 
councils of the Inquisitor. King Philip, entirely 
under the influence of the Grand Inquisitor Valdes, 
summoned the Archbishop Carranza to the court, 
and the trusties of the holy office arrested the prelate 
at night in bed, and King Philip who had but re- 
cently thrust the greatest honors upon the prelate 
Carranza now became eager to humiliate him. 

Indeed, it is not difficult to guess who turned the 
King's mind into such utter and relentless hatred ! 

Yes. The king is afraid the religious reform 
movement may take the same course in Spain as in 
Germany ; where they have done away not only with 
the formalities of bowings and kneelings, and the 
millinery of flower decorations, but also burst the 
bonds of spiritual tyranny, 

tins. The black catalogue of the misdeeds of that 
cruel bigot is appalling, and the superstition im- 
planted at present in the minds of the people is most 
shocking. Spain will have to suffer for centuries to 
come from the after-effects of these outrages com- 
mitted on the human reason. The black soldiers of 
the church allege now that their prayers restore 
health to the sick, sight to the blind, teeth to the 
toothless ; their relics are potent in cases of fever 
and childbirth, flesh wounds and heart disease ; and 
earthquakes both in Italy and Spain are appeased by 

179 



their invocations; Loyola's portrait sweated in a 
village church of New Granada for twenty-one days 
shortly before the death of the vice-roy ; one of their 
bones relieved the parturient pangs of the Duchess of 
Uzeda, and another cured the ague of the pious 
Queen Margaret ; they macerate bones, but if we do 
it, it is a capital sin and the "Holy Father" flings a 
bunch of fulminations in our face. The Inquisitor 
Torquemada sent the sorceress to the stake, yet pro- 
tected himself from poison by keeping a piece of 
unicorn's horn on his table. 

Yes. Indeed to stupefy the human mind, to im- 
plant in it the most nauseating superstition, to crush 
down scientific research and to commit any kind of 
outrage in the name of God, that is what they call 
the true faith. 

tins. The King, the Great Inquisitor Valdes and 
the relentless, unsparing butcher, the Duke d' Alva, 
are a fine trinity of champions of the true faith. 
Master Vesalius, don't forget that when King Philip 
returned to Spain and arrived at Volladolid, assum- 
ing the reins of government, this auspicious event 
was celebrated by an auto-da-fe, at which the bal- 
conies and the galleries were brilliantly filled with 
orthodox grandees feasting their eyes complacently 
upon the cruelties inflicted upon the heretical vic- 
tims. It was at that very butchery that King Philip 
expressed the sentiment which so gladdened the 
hearts and strengthened the hands of the savage 
priesthood. When Don Corlos de Sesa, one of the 
noblest and best sufferers, passed beneath the royal 
balcony he appealed to the King to know the cause 
for which he was sentenced to die. "I would my- 



self," said the King, "carry the wood to burn my 
son, were he a heretic like you!" 

Well, Master Vesalius, I beg leave. I have to get 
some important information. {Exit tinselrri). 

Ves. My heart is bleeding and agonized to the 
point of death at the sight of such horrible crimes 
perpetrated under the name of Christianity. What 
a terrible struggle between the old faith and the new 
gospel ! 

I am overwhelmned with grief when I see thou- 
sands and thousands of people burnt at the stake 
and when I learn that other thousands suffer untold 
pains on the torturing rack or rot away in olammy 
dungeons. I should be in deadly despair did not 
three wondrous stars shed their brilliant and in- 
vigorating light on my dark and thorny path — my 
own dear Sylvia, my dear friend Anselm and my be- 
loved science. (Exit Vesalius.) 



SCENE II. 
Vesalius and Sylvia, Later ttnselm. 

Ves. At last, dear Sylvia, I have accomplished all 
I was striving for. My treatise on anatomy, illus- 
trated with Master de Kalkar's beautiful engravings, 
has established my fame all over Europe, and spread 
knowledge and enlightenment. To my high station 
in life, as the body physician of the late Emperor, 
and at present of King Philip, I owe my success, which 
has put an end to the intrigue of the medical 



fraternity as well as to the malicious persecutions of 
the church. 

The advice of our dear friend Anselm not to resign 
my professorship at the university of Padua, under 
the patronage of the illustrious Republic of Venice — 
well meant as it was — and his warning not to accept 
the offer of Emperor Charles V to serve as the chief 
surgeon of the imperial Netherlandish army, and all 
his misgivings, have been proved to be groundless. 
His belief and his fear do not come true — that said 
offer might be nothiDg short of a devilish scheme of 
the priestcraft, or of the spies of the Inquisition, or 
of the Jesuits, to lure me to the imperial court and 
thus into the snares of my deadly enemies. 

But your prediction, dear Sylvia, that the splendor 
emanating from the great and mighty ruler, Emperor 
Charles V, would benefit my scientific researches 
has come true. Well, my fame is firmly established, 
but to crown my life and to give me a heavenly re- 
ward for all I have suffered I beg, dear Sylvia, "Do 
be my wife." 

Sylvia. My dear friend, from the first moment we 
met my heart belonged to you to its last drop of 
blood. Here is my hand, Vesalius, to-morrow will 
be our wedding day. 

( Vesalius embraces and kisses Sylvia. JLnselm 
enters.) 

Yes. Dear friend, Anselm, you are here at the 
proper time to congratulate us ; to-morrow dear 
Sylvia will be my wife. Why, friend Anselm, it 
seems you are rather slow with your congratula- 
tions ! 

Sylvia. Friend Anselm is bewildered by the glad 



tidings. I have some orders to issue, but I shall 
soon be back. (She goes.) 

Yes. Friend Anselm it appears as if you must 
have good reasons for holding back with your con- 
gratulations. What is the matter ? 

tins. All of us are in great danger, and I advise 
taking to flight as soon as possible ! The iron arm 
of the Inquisition is reaching out to take firm hold 
of us ! In fact, I think we are all lost ! 

Yes. Dear friend Anselm, you see specters I Even 
if it were as you say, the members of the Tribunal 
of the Inquisition belong to the order of the begging 
friars and are responsible to the higher courts. 

tins. {Laboring under suppressed excitement 
and speaking in constrained voice.) I admit the 
members of the Inquisition belong to the order of 
the begging friars, but they claim independence of 
their superiors and insist upon the right to eleot 
their own subaltern officers and representatives. 
With the exception of the Pope the Inquisitors are 
not responsible to anybody. What the Pope thinks 
about the heretics as a whole, and about you, Master 
Vesalius, in particular, you can easily imagine. 

Yes. At any rate the Inquisitors are responsible 
to their own conscience 1 

fins. Supposing that they have one ! Their 
tenets, it is true, read as you Bay, Master Vesalius. 

Yes. Dear friend Anselm, it seems as if you were 
trying to scare me. 

$Lns. Far from that ! I simply warn you. You 
have been exposed for a long time to the dazzling 
sun of the imperial and royal court of the mighiest 
rulers of Christendom and for that reason ysu do not 



teo the danger that is brewing ; the intrigues of the 
black cowls are becoming bolder day by day. 

Yes. The King's powerful arm will be strong 
enough to protect me against the malice and wiles of 
my enemies! 

tins. Although his dominions are so vast that 
the sun never sets within them, the sun of enlighten- 
ment has not even risen and will never rise within 
him. {Be looks about Mm and whispers.) King 
Philip is the worst enemy of enlightenment, and — 

Ves. Well, Anselm, what do you mean? 

tins. The royal splendor prevents you from seeing 
that the stake has already been piled up to cremate 
you. 

Yes. What ought I to do, friend Anselm. 

.tins. Pray descend from your high and splendid 
position and the hatred of the medical fraternity 
and of the Spaniards will cease, and thus the num- 
ber of your enemies will dwindle down to half. Of 
course the deadly enmity of the church will always 
be your portion. 

Yes. If I step out of the magic circle of the royal 
sun I shall be instantly annihilated by the Inquisi- 
tion! 

tins. Master Vesalius, let us take to flight I 

Yes. Once again to go out of the way of the black 
hydra! I have taken flight more than once, and 
have failed to escape ! That monster is everywhere, 
and I am now of the same opinion as you — that the 
Inquisition has spread its snares and extended its 
espionage over all Europe ; everywhere we encounter 
their spies, every exponent of independent thought 
is hunted to death. Like moles the agents of the 



Inquisition ceaselessly engage in their nefarious 
work, until suddenly and unexpectedly the strong 
and merciless arm of the Inquisition reaches out of the 
dark and seizes its victim. From it there is no escape. 

From their records, most carefully kept, as soon as 
opportunity offers, they draw their material for the 
indictment of whole families, and often the accused 
ones are surprised at the pointing out of small 
offenses which they scarcely recollect themselves. 

tins. Let us take to flight, Master Vesalius. Let 
us take refuge in the new discovered world. There 
we shall find a spot where we can get some peace ; at 
Cadiz there is a craft ready to set sail for the New 
World. 

Even the mightiest King of Christendom, King 
Philip, can not protect you. Of a frowning and 
despotic character he has been educated by monks, 
and, instigated by the Jesuits, he harbors an irre- 
concilable hatred against any kind of religious re- 
form movement. He is the head of the federation of 
the Catholic faith, and, therefore, he can not protect 
you even if he wants to, and — 

Yes. Well, "and—" 

Sins. Oh, Master Vesalius, don't ask me! The 
King is not able to protect you any longer, and per- 
haps he will not protect you any longer ! 

Yes. Well, then I am doomed! I do not fear 
death, as I shall suffer for the sake of free thought 
and for the liberty of belief and conscience. The 
two martyrs of truth, Hubs and Savanarola, have 
died a glorious death, setting an admirable example 
to the whole world! I will stay right here in Madrid, 
friend Anselm. 



Sins. You know, Master Vesalius, everybody ia 
bound to denounce whatever he or she learns about 
heresy ; everybody who fails to do so, is to be con- 
sidered a heretic and treated as such! The rules 
read that he or she who gets acquainted with a heretic 
without denouncing him is liable to capital punish- 
ment. A woman at Toulouse frightened to death by 
such rulings of the Blood Tribunal falsely de- 
nounced 169 persons as heretics! 

Another ruling reads that all those who denounce 
their accomplices will escape punishment, and will 
even be rewarded. 

Yes. Well, I know that my friend Anselm will 
not choose that way to escape punishment I 

Sins. Master Vesalius, recently all the inhabitants 
of Madrid have been invited to denounce all those 
whom they suspect of not having the right faith or 
of living in another manner than the rest of the in- 
habitants ! 

All those who do not obey that admonition are 
ipso facto ex-communicated and the annullment of 
ex-communication can only be made by the Inquisi- 
tion. I know for certain that both of us have been 
denounced not only as suspected heretics, but for 
being well known believers in the new faith, and the 
proceedings of the Inquisition against us are immi- 
nent ! Master Vesalius, have you not as a physician 
treated some heretics? 

Yes. Indeed, I have. 

Sins. This puts you under another indictment, 
and he who is under such an indictment is very 
rarely dismissed. The rules of the Inquisition read 
that "the physioian who treats a heretic is as guilty 



as the patient who gets the advice of a heretical 
physician." 

Ves. I am going to see my fri«nd Mercado, the 
most famous jurist and lawyer in Madrid. I thank 
you, my dear friend Anselm, with all my heart for 
your good and timely advice. 

?lns. Oh, Master Vesalius, listen! You forget 
that Pope Innocent III. has forbidden any lawyer to 
defend heretics, or even well-wishers of heretics 1 
You forget, Master Vesalius, that this interdict 
issued during the thirteenth century has been 
maliciously interpreted and stretched, and, therefore, 
no lawyer dares defend any one indicted for heresy, 
for in such event the lawyer runs the risk of being 
proceeded against as a heretio himself ! 

Have the Inquisitors nat repeatedly admonished 
against placing reliance upon the chicanery of law- 
yers and altogether against upholding firm rules and 
formalities? 

Therefore, you the accused, will be confronted with 
the Inquisitors of the Blood Tribunal without any 
protection ; no witnesses will confront you, as this is 
done very rarely, and, besides, the Blood Tribunal is 
bound to the greatest reticence and all the proceed- 
ings of the execution of the sentence are enveloped 
in the darkest secrecy. One of the authorities of the 
Inquisition teaches : "Also the Lord has secretly 
tried Adam and Eve and has not permitted the ser- 
pent to defend them, neither has he summoned any 
witnesses." 

Yes. I feel the venomous breath of the black 
hydra; the coils of the Inquisition are tightening 
around the whole world ! Shall I now give way to 



my enemies? No indeed! I have devoted my life 
to the contest of securing to mankind the most 
sacred of blessings, the freedom of thought and con- 
science, and ( lifting up his hands) upon my solemn 
oath I shall be faithful to my oath until I breathe 
my last I And I shall not shrink from suffering 
torture and death ! 

£ns. Although the Canon Law forbids the forcing 
of an avowal by torture, the torture is employed in 
spite of the Canon Law in all cases of heresy, to the 
fullest extent and with unheard of cruelty. 

Besides the torture, the Tribunal of the Inquisition 
makes use of imprisonment in clammy dungeons, 
aggravated by fasting, and indicted persons have 
been kept in prison for years and have been ulti- 
mately tortured on the rack or by fasting until they 
confessed. Many of them are forced to fast for days 
and are then given strong wine in order that being 
drunk they may then become communicative. 

Yes. My whole life is an avowal of my principles 
and of my belief ! 

3lns. Indeed, Master Vesalius, your whole life is 
a confession of your heresy, a bold public self-indict- 
ment, an unconditional avowal ; consequently they 
do not need to torture a confession out of you. 

Yes. The flaming stake is a torch that throws its 
light into future centuries ; to die as a martyr of the 
truth is not too high a price. 

Ans, But you are not sure to die a martyr's death 
at the stake. They have frequently held prisoners 
for years, and even for tens of years, until lost to the 
world, and after such a time cremated them at the 
stake ! 



Imprisonment for life, chastising, fasting, pil- 
grimages, fines, the bearing of badges of infamy, are 
meted out only to those who repent, and you, Master 
Vesalius, might have very good reason to repent, or 
at least to feign repentance ! 

Yes. What in the world is the matter with you, 
friend Anselm ! How can you entertain such strange 
thoughts? 

£ns. Master Vesalius, you forget that Pope Inno- 
cent IV. has pronounced it laudable if parents de- 
nounce their children, children their parents, mar- 
ried women their husbands or their lovers. And if 
not reported within one year after the heresy is dis- 
covered the innocent and the guilty party shall be 
treated alike ! 

Any member of the family or a servant of the in- 
dicted one is acceptable as a witness, and his or her 
testimony is considered to be very valuable if it is 
of a damaging nature ; if their testimony is favor- 
able for the defendant it is not held to be of much 
worth. In addition, any testimony favorable to the 
defendant can be withdrawn at any time, but not so 
any damaging testimony. 

Ves. Don't be alarmed either about me or about 
yourself. The Canon Law forbids the torturing of 
the defendant, and he who has been put on the rack 
in spite of that law has the right of appeal to the 
Pope. 

tins. Pray, Master Vesalius, the same Canon Law 
forbids the clergy to take active part in the tortur- 
ing and execution of heretics, although the priests 
might be considered more trustworthy in that re- 
spect than the laymen. 



But Pope Hadrian IV. found an expedient by 
granting the Inquisitors and their helpmates the 
right of absolving one another in case of transgress- 
ing that law. As in the statutes forbidding the tor- 
turing of the defendants only the latter are men- 
tioned, they fiercely torture the witnesses if they do 
not give the testimony that the Inquisitors want. 

Ves. No doubt, friend Anselm, you have thor- 
oughly studied the fearful system of the Inquisition, 
but, mind, do not fear the possibility of being sum- 
moned as a witness against me, as I can at any time 
appeal to the Pope. 

&ns. Those who are to be tortured can not appeal 
to the Pope but only those who have been tortured, 
but the Pope is far away, and the expenses incurred 
in an appeal to the Curia in Rome are so enormous 
that but few are able to appeal, and even a favorable 
decision of the Pope can never undo the excruciable 
agony suffered on the rack. {Placing his hands 
upon his heart) Master Vesalius, you ought to 
know that Anselm does not plead for his own sake, 
as his life is devoted to you and he is at any time 
ready and prepared to sacrifice it for the sake of his 
friends, but for your own sake Vesalius, and for the 
sake of the guiding star of your life, for Sylvia's 
sake ! As soon as the torturers take hold of me I 
know my time has come, and (pulling a small vial 
out of his pocket and flourishing il) I know what I 
have to do ! 

I do not plead for n^self when I say "let us take 
flight before it is too late !" And if you do not follow 
my advice, Master Vesalius, your soul will suffer the 
most excruciating agony because you will realize 



that you have caused an innocent being to be put on 
the rack. 

Ves. What do you mean, friend Anselm? 

tins. I mean to say (hesitatingly) that you will 
cause Sylvia to be placed on the torturing rack, as 
she will be summoned as a witness against you. 

Ves. ( Thunderstruck.) For heaven's sake, 
friend Anselm, the mere thought beclouds my in- 
tellect I 

tins. Sylvia is in immediate danger! She has 
been closely watched ! 

Ves. If so, friend Anselm, let us flee at once. I 
go to see Duke d' Alva, 

tins. Don't do that, I beg you, Master Vesalius ! 

Ves. Duke d' Alva has always been true to the 
late Emperor, and was a faithful adherent of the 
Emperor in his declining days. 

tins. Duke d' Alva is a fanatical demon, a fit in- 
strument of any kind of violence ! Look at his high 
brazen forehead, his deep-sunk sparkling eyes, his 
stubborn and revengeful character. Presiding over 
the fearful court of the Blood Tribunal he feels com- 
fortable. 

Ves. You forget, friend Anselm, that Duke d' 
Alva has always been considered the flower of Span- 
ish chivalry, and, in addition, he has gained a 
splendid military renown, and wherever the impos- 
sible was to be done, Alva was called upon, and it 
was through him that successes were achieved in 
Africa, Italy, Hungary and the Netherlands. To his 
daring courage was due the victory in the battle of 
Muhlberg, where he triumphed over the hesitating 
wisdom of the Emperor. Against the heretics, such 



as he holds the Protestants to be, he is, I admit, 
governed by the utmost fanaticism, and that means 
to him the upholding of the sacred cause of God. No 
doubt his noble mind has hardened by war and 
diplomacy and they have rendered him capable of 
committing the most bloody deeds. 

sins. Indeed, {in a whisper,) his acts have degen- 
erated into acts of tyranny and cruelty. In fact, 
Duke d' Alva is the most cruel bloodhound of the 
Spanish Inquisition and I fear you will soon have to 
face him. 

Yes. Then I am going to see His Majesty, King 
Philip ! 

Sins. For heaven's sake, don't do that! Listen, 
listen, Master Vesalius! Don't you remember that 
when, the other day, Don Carlos de Sesa, one of the 
noblest and best of sufferers, passed beneath the 
royal balcony to the flaming stake, he appealed to the 
King to know the cause for which he was sentenced 
to die, King Philip said : "I should myself carry the 
wood to burn my own son, were he a heretic like 
you." 

Sins. Don't do that, this is my last appeal ! {Exit 
Vesalius.) 

(slnselm, seeing that Ms advice is not heeded, 
slops shorl and with arms folded stands wrapped 
in thought, then pressing his hands to his face, and 
with signs of great mental agony, he departs. In 
a moment a secret closet hidden in the pedestal of 
one of the statues, adorning the library, opens, and 
the (Dominican friar sneaks out and spies about.) 

Friar. "Indeed it is to take flight ere it is too 
late." Well, this time it is too late 1 



Vesalius, the heretic, and his bewitching fay 
Are now quite ripe for an auto-da-fe ! 

Just this minute a wonderful, diabolical idea 
strikes me ; if cleverly managed even the devil can 
be pressed into the service of the Holy Church ! 

I am going to denounce Vesalius for having dis- 
sected one of the ladies at court while her heart was 
still beating. Such tricks take a wonderful effect 
upon the Spanish credulous rabble who have been 
brought up and leavened by the "black cowls." The 
end justifies the means ! (Exit) 



SCENE III. 



Madrid. Philip II., King of Spain, in His Apart- 
menls. 

The King. {Musing.) I wonder if Vesalius is 
going to renounce. I think he will not. I am afraid 
this will be his last audience ; he is doomed. 

( The King touches a bell, page enters.) 

The King. Where is Vesalius? 

(The page draws the portiere, Vesalius enters). 

The King. (.Frowning.) The world is out of 
gear and my empire is in a turmoil ; even St. Peter's 
throne is shaken to its foundation. 

It is satan's artifice that has infected the souls of 
my subjects with the rankest heresy. 

Ves. Majesty, some people think it is the irre- 
sistible force of new truths that shakes Europe in 
every quarter, and truth is invincible. 



The King. Satan has not anything in common 
with truth, he is the prince of falsehood. 

It is his hellish artifice that has caused all domin- 
ions where the Holy Cross is worshipped to be visited 
with spiritual leprosy, with heresy. Satan is pulling 
hard on the chains with which h® is shackled; it is 
he who has woven the intricate fabric of lies which 
the people are made to believe under the name of a 
new gospel. It is nothing but a renewed attempt of 
the prince of darkness to regain full sway over the 
world ! 

On studying the fate of whole nations, and the 
holy scriptures and traditions, we notice not only the 
hand of the Lord but are also shocked by the power 
the devil still possesses. 

Yes. I think he has full sway only over the minds 
of those people who believe in him. I have time and 
again asked myself whether the prince of darkness is 
not but a nightmare of intimidated minds, or, maybe, 
a mere concoction of schemers. 

The King. Your remark, Vesalius, shows that you 
have been for too long a time exposed to the atmos- 
phere of Flanders and Germany, both countries 
being seriously infected by the virulent contagion of 
heresy. 

In addition, it seems you have forgotten that even 
the powerful protection you enjoy as my body phy- 
sician is limited at least in one direction ; in the 
realm of the Holy Church I cease to be a King and 
am but a devoted Christian. 

Who has fanned to name the war of the Hussites 
in Bohemia? Whs has carried the torch of civil war 
into holy France? Who has shaken my empire to 



its foundation, who other than the disciples of that 
hellish artifice called the new faith! 

Is there any country the equal of my dominion, 
with its financial resources? Is not my empire so 
vast that the sun never sets within its boundaries? 
And has not God the Almighty opened for the wor- 
shippers of the Holy Cross the inexhaustible gold 
mines of Peru and Mexico, in order to defend the 
realm of the Lord against the machinations of the 
devil? 

Is there another empire with the unlimited polit- 
ical power of the Spanish monarchy? All these tre- 
mendous political resources I am going to employ 
against the Queen Elizabeth of England, that heretic 
that protects my Protestant subjects and that has 
placed herself at the head of that religious party 
to destroy which I have stirred heaven and earth. 

Don't you realize, Vesalius, that the devil's hand 
is in all this? 

Yes. The liberation of the people from the re- 
straint imposed upon their faith and cod science might 
perhaps harmonize present discordant opinions. 

The King. This is the language of the backsliders, 
who have either abandoned the true faith or been 
deluded into adoption of new-fangled and unsound 
doctrines, and led on to heresy by the ignis faluus 
called science. 

If I did not count you among the latter, Vesalius, 
you would have felt a long time ago the iron arm of 
the Holy Inquisition. 

I esteem and cherish your medical skill, Vesalius. 
You listen to the beats of my heart, while I am 
listening to the throbbing of the hearts of whole 



nations, ruled by this, my hand. I often spend 
sleepless nights thinking of and planning for the re- 
ligious interests and welfare of the souls of millions 
of my subjects, even of those in the remotest parts of 
my vast dominion. 

The mysteries that envelope the innermost life of 
the soul, and the happiness of the heart, are no sub- 
jects for your scalpel, Vesalius ; you can dissect a 
heart, but you cannot dissect a soul. 

What you cannot cure you cut off, the welfare of 
the soul needs more subtle remedies than steel. Your 
draughts and your salves cannot comfort a soul 
lacerated by remorse, nor can your blood-letting re- 
lieve a soul surfeited with a plethora of unsound 
doctrines. 

To cure the ailments of the soul we have no use 
for your mixtures, but we need the healing agencies 
of religion; confession and repentance of sin, peni- 
tence and remission of sins, are our remedies. 

In my exalted position I need a man of matters of 
fact, but not a high-flying visionary. ( (Raising his 
voice.) The pestilence of heresy has taken hold of 
my subjects and I will give those who have been led 
astray a fearful object lesson and try to bring back 
straying souls into the fold of the Holy Church. My 
criminal courts will be heard of the world over. In- 
stead of bullfights my subjects shall have numberless 
auto-da-fe's. 

Yes. I venture to say that it may prove an im- 
possibility to check the spring that comes forth to 
rejuvenate the world; we can hem in the onward 
stride of progress, but we cannot stop it. 

Your Majesty would bestow the greatest boon upon 



your subjects by granting them liberty of belief. 
Tens of thousands of Your Majesty's subjects flee 
from your dominion to England and she receives 
them with the open arms of a mother. Those emi- 
grants comprise those possessed of the most gifted 
minds and the most skilled hands. Thus Your 
Majesty loses valuable subjects, who tend greatly to 
make England prosperous. The Englishmen are 
overjoyed at seeing their enemies, Your Majesty's 
subjects, bleeding to death from self-inflicted wounds. 

The King. It is nothing else save the heretic 
movement that makes the Spanish sovereignity, or 
the Spanish yoke, as they call it, intolerable to them. 
It is the so-called Reformation that gave those mis- 
creants the courage and the financial means to rebel. 
Is it the heralding of a new truth, as you call it, that 
has caused the Confederation of the Protestant 
States? No indeed, it is not the irresistible force of 
a revealed truth that has caused the chaos ; the chaos 
has been brought about because the people believed 
the new heretical faith to be true. 

The abuses of the church as regards indulgence, 
and the often arrogant demands of the church, may 
have aroused the minds of the people, but the abuse 
of the rights and customs of the church does not 
prove that those divine tenets and time-honored cus- 
toms have ceased to be true aod rightful. 

It was the alluring idea of becoming independent 
of Rome and Madrid ; and moreover, in addition, it 
was the unquenchable and insatiable greed for the 
spoil to be derived from the secularization of the 
richest convents, of charitable and religious institu- 
tions, that made sovereigns desirous of the "im- 



proved" religion. It was a mere political scheme, a 
state affair pure and 'simple, but not a religious one. 

If my beloved father, the Emperor Charles V., the 
most powerful ruler of the world, but intoxicated by 
his unlimited power, had not attacked the preroga- 
tives and privileges of the assembly of the States of 
Germany, there would not have been any Federation 
of Protestants for the protection of religious liberty. 

In Germany the religious schism has been followed 
by a political secession, and a confederacy of the 
Protestants has been established under the pretext 
of preventing political suppression. That confed- 
eracy of Protestants must be annihilated ; it is the 
will of the Lord. I am his humble tool and have the 
mission to carry out the plan of the Lord. My arms 
have received the blessing of the vicar of the Lord, 
the Holy father in Rome. 

In France it was the frantic ambition of the 
Princes Conde and Coligni that placed them at the 
head of the Calvinistic heretics. 

Moreover, it was not only the policy of various 
governments that took advantage of the heretical 
movement, but private greed, too, took advantage of 
the "new faith," and the Netherlands refused to pay 
the levy of the tenth and twentieth penny. This 
"new faith" of not fulfilling one's duty and of re- 
fusing to pay taxes is indeed more comfortable than 
the old faith. ((Raising Ms voice.) It is your kind 
of faith, Vesalius, that has started the rebellion in 
the Netherlands ! 

The nations believe they are fighting for a new 
truth, while in fact they wage their battles from the 
lust of power of their sovereigns and for their desire 



of increasing their dominions. Those sovereigns em- 
brace the new faith, as it is the "sesame" that opens 
the pockets of their subjects. 

The misled people put whole armies, raised at 
their own expense, at the disposal of their respective 
sovereigns, and believe that they shed their blood for 
the truth, while, in fact, they wage their battles from 
the greed for booty and for the exclusive advantage 
of their rulers. 

The common people are children and need guard- 
ianship for their bodily as well as for their spiritual 
welfare. They need men who have the power either 
to bless or condemn them. 

Vesalius, you have been led astray. I am sorry 
for you ! 

(The King signifies the end of the audience. 
Exit Vesalius.} 



SCENE IV. 



Ante Chamber of King Philip. Duke d' Alva, 
Spanish Grandees, Grand Inquisitor y Vesalius. 

Duke d 7 Alva. {Speaking with a sneering lone lo 
Vesalius, as he departs from the royal apartments.) 
Well Vesalius, have you succeeded in converting His 
Gracious Majesty to your so-called new truth? I 
doubt it. 

Ves. I expect and demand that Your Highness 
treat me with the esteem due to me according to 
Spanish custom and ceremonial. It is to the credit 
of a gentleman to so conduct himself. 



(Duke d y £lva. For Flanders we do not need 
Spanish ceremonial, and for the Netherlands, where 
you hail from, we write down Spanish laws with the 
sword ; we teach by the wound we inflict ; blood is 
the ink we use and blood is a remedy much more 
efficient than all your remedies. 

The Lord sits in judgment in heaven, and we dis- 
pose justice o« earth. (He touches his sword, mak- 
ing it clank.) This is the scalpel I use to cut open 
the plague boils of heresy. (He strikes once more 
his sword.) This is my scythe, with which I mow 
down the luxuriant growth of wild oats of the new 
gospel and lay low in broad swath the followers of 
its new and false doctrines. 

And here are my prescriptions. (Re takes a large 
portfolio out of a pocket of his doublet) Look 
here, four hundred well counted death warrants, 
signed in advance by His Majesty, and to be used in 
your native land, the low countries. 

What well-meaning advice does not cure, the 
sword will cure ; and what cannot be cured by the 
sword will be cured by the flaming stake. You see, 
Vesalius, I am in fact the body-physician of our 
Most Gracious King ; I know how to treat efficiently 
the plague of heresy, even so, if the body-physician 
of our Gracious Monarch turnB out to be himself a 
heretic. 

Yes. Duke, did you ever try to feel like a human 
being? 

Duke d' yllva. Yes; for once I was what you call 
a human being. In other words, I was scared, and 
being scared is not d' Alva's way. Not to be afraid 
of anything — that is d' Alva's nature. 



Let all the heretics of Europe have one head and 
<T Alva and his sword will do the rest. Pile up a 
stake sky high, and have all the heretics, including 
you, Vesalius, seated on it, and without the flutter of 
eye-lash I shall fling the firebrand on that pile and 
enlighten the world in my way. And this is also the 
way His Gracious Majesty is thinking. 

I am a good Christian, and I am at any time ready 
and prepared to do everything for the glory of the 
Lord and for the comfort of our Most Gracious King. 
And you Vesalius, do you remember the time when 
you were the Surgeon General in the Netherlandish 
army of Emperor Charles V.? 

Yes. Certainly, I do. 

T>uTce d? Alva. And is the name Aquila still in 
your mind ? 

Yes. I know whom you mean. 

<DuJce d' Alva. Well, I want to call to your recol- 
lection the fact that Caspar Aquila was chaplain in 
the imperial Netherlandish army, and at the time I 
refer to refused to baptize a cannon ball which the 
sportful but faithful soldiers asked him to do that 
they might shoot it into the camp of the heretics. 
His refusal to do so caused the soldiers to suspect 
him of heresy, and they resolved to put him into one 
of the big mortars and send him, instead of the can- 
non ball, into the camp of the backsliders, but the 
powder had become moist and so they could not 
touch him off. 

It was you who urged the soldiers to pull that 
heretic out of the mortar, otherwise the soldiers 
would have got some dry powder to send that eagle 
on his flight high in the air. But, you have only to 



go over to the Santa Casa; there you will find, 
booked in the archives of the Holy Inquisition, your 
whole career from start to finish. 

Remember, further, that when Emperor Charles 
V, after the battle at Muhlberg, on his way to Suabia, 
passed through Thuringia in the heart of Germany 
the Countess Katharine procured a letter of protec- 
tion from the Emperor to protect her subjects from 
what they might have to suffer from the Spanish 
army marching through her territory. 

It was you, Vesalius, who entreated the Emperor 
to grant that letter of protection, and one of the 
proteges of the Countess was that arch-heretic Aquila, 
formerly a chaplain of the imperial Netherlandish 
army! 

Yes, Vesalius, among those reformatory birds that 
enjoyed the protection of the Countess Katharine I 
had ferreted out that gallow-bird, Casper Aquila, 
whom you assisted out of the big mortar in which 
the soldiers had placed him. That former chaplain 
of the imperial army in the Netherlands was then a 
preacher of the heretics at a town by the name of 
Salfield, near the castle of the countess, and I had 
promised a reward of five thousand florins for his 
capture, as that bold heretic had attacked from the 
pulpit the Interim of the Emperor Charles V. in a 
most shocking manner. This time not only the 
mortar was at hand into which to crowd that scoun- 
drel and make him soar up to the sky, but this time 
the powder was dry. Alas ! instead of meeting his 
well-deserved death, that bird escaped once more ! 

I admit that at the castle of th3 Countess Katharine 
I trembled with fear for the first time in my life, 



being completely cut off from my army, but now, 
Vesalius, your time has come to tremble 1 

{£1 that moment the Grand Inquisitor lays his 
hand on Vesalius' shoulder.) 

Grand Inquis. This is the heavy iron arm of the 
Holy Inquisition. From this yery moment your life 
is in jeopardy. 

(^ portiere is drawn and four halbardiers ap- 
proach Vesalius, chain him and lead him away.) 

Duke d' &lva. ( Turning to the Grand Inquisi- 
tor.) I congratulate you and all the lands where 
the Holy Cross is worshipped upon the exaotness 
and wonderful precision with which the admirable 
machinery of the Holy Inquisition does its work 1 

The Grandees. {Bowing.) We, too, congratulate 
Your Highness upon your holy work ! Long live the 
Holy Inquisition for the benefit of the Holy Church 
and for the higher glory of the Lord! 



SCENE V. 
Vesalius Before the Tribunal of the Inquisition. 

Grand Inquisitor. Vesalius you are indicted for 
having committed a number of capital sins. Do you 
plead guilty? 

Yes. Plead guilty? What am I indicted for? 

Gr. Inquis. All the crimes you have committed 
are recorded in the archives of the Holy Inquisition 
at the Santa Casa, and in addition they have been 
established by witnesses. 



Yes. Who are the witnesses who testified againBt 
me; why do you not confront me with them? 

Gr. Inquis. It is not customary to summon wit- 
nesses to appear before this Holy Tribunal. The 
truth of your record in the Santa Casa is beyond all 
doubt, and more than sufficient to sentence you to 
death. In fact, you ought to have seven lives to ex- 
piate by capital punishment the sins you have com- 
mitted. 

It is not customary to tell the defendant the names 
of witnesses, in your case especially you had better 
not ask for the names of the witnesses who have tes- 
tified against you and whom you wish to be con- 
fronted with. 

Yes. I insist upon being confronted with them. 

Gr. Inquis. I repeat you have no right to ask for 
that; you have been accused and found guilty of 
heresy and your life is forfeited. Are you ready and 
prepared to renounce all your teachings and to burn 
all your manuscripts? 

Yes. I won't do that. 

Gr. Inquis. If that is the case you cannot enter- 
tain hope of any mercy. A man facing death and 
refusing mercy acts not only cruelly unto himself, 
but adds to the embarrassment of his friends. One 
of the witnesses who testified against you is also 
guilty of heresy ; his name is Anselm. 

Yes. {Thunderstruck.) Impossible! 

Gr. Inquis. There is no such word to be found in 
the realm of the Holy Inquisition. 

Yes. Treachery of such a friend is an impossibilty ! 

Gr. Inquis. Anselm is not only your accuser, but 
also your accomplice. 



Ves. I am sure be is not my accuser 1 

Gr. Inquis. Anselm has not renounced and has 
been found guilty as an arch-heretic of the worst 
kind. Your refusal to renounce your heresy and to 
incinerate your manuscripts precipitates his fate. 

You seem to believe that we are not in earnest, 
mark and let it be a warning to you. (He touches a 
bell on the ladle, and instantly a great tumult 
arises outside of the court room, the door of which 
is pushed open and a number of halbardiers usher in 
dnselm, treating him most roughly; his hands are 
lied to his back and a rope is fastened around his 
neck; at sight of this fearful proceeding Vesalius 
covers Ids face with his hands.) 

tins. ( Shouting as he g9es past ) Hail to science 
and free thought! No recantation! I am on my 
last legs; Master Vesalius, moriiurus ie salulal! 

Ves. Good bye, good bye, my dear own friend 
Anselm. 

{Shortly after JLnselm has been pushed out of a 
door on the opposite side a sickening thud is heard.) 

Gr. Inquis. The mills of the Holy Tribunal are 
grinding fast. It was a hard thud, meaning that 
Anselm's hard head has been laid to his feet; he has 
got what he deserved. He did not recant his heresy 
in spite of being put three times on the rack. And 
look here at this vial he had hidden in his ear, with 
the aid of its poisonous contents he was to commit 
another crime, intending to commit suicide. You see, 
Vesalius, we are in earnest. Are you now prepared to 
recant your heresy and burn all your manuscripts ? 

Ves. Most certainly not ! you have murdered my 
friend Anselm. 



Gr. Inquis. It is your own fault that precipitated 
his fate ; if you had recanted, his life might have 
been spared. 

Yes. What are the indictments brought against me? 

Gr. Inquis. You are indicted for and have been 
convicted of grave-robbery, perpetrated at Louvain 
in the Netherlands. Here (pointing to a human 
ITiigh hone) lies the corpus delicti. This is a orime 
deserving capital punishment. You remember this 
is the os femoris you flourished at Paris in the 
auditorium of Professor Sylvius? 

At the same place, at Louvain, where you plun- 
dered the gallows and graves, you thrust your sword 
through an altar piece, and while committing that 
sacrilege you were uttering the rankest heresies, slan- 
dering the holy church and abusing the priesthood. 

At Paris you committed another felony, eulogizing 
the astronomical discoveries of the heretic, Coper- 
nicus, who denies the truth of the astronomical 
teachings of the Bible. He did well dying within 
the same year, otherwise he would have breathed his 
last at the stake. 

In addition, you have been indicted and convicted 
of having indulged in a most shocking conversation 
on the border of the Rhine, above Basel, and of try- 
ing to kill a Dominican friar who overheard your 
conversation. 

Furthermore, you are guilty of having delivered 
the rankest heretical eulogy in favor of all the arch- 
heretics, Luther, Melanchton, Zwingli, and others, 
when you were tendered an ovation by the students 
of Padua and adorned with the laurel wreath that 
lies in front of you. 



As the records of the Holy Inquisition show you 
have committed another capital sin by rendering 
your professional services to heretics. 

Seventh, you have committed still another crime 
deserving capital punishment, to wit : You dissected 
the body of one of the ladies at court of our most 
Gracious Majesty, though her heart was still beating ! 

Yes. What an infernal lie ! 

Gr. Inquis. Thus the records in the archives of 
the Holy Inquisition in the Santa Casa show that 
you have committed seven capital sins and you 
ought to have seven lives to expiate them. The 
fulmination of the Pope is imminent. Well, are you 
willing to recant all your heretical teachings and 
burn all your manuscripts? We have seized them 
and they are here on the table just in front of you. 

Yes. I have nothing to recant; all that I have 
taught in word and print I can prove to be true. 

Gr. Inquis. Are you going to send still another 
accuser and accomplice of yours over the rack into 
death? Look over there ! 

{In the background a blade portiere is drawn 
and a lorlure chamber is visible, in the background 
of which appears Sylvia, standing between two tor- 
turers. Her head is bandaged with a while blood- 
stained cloth; on the back wall of the torture- 
chamber hangs a large crucifix; on one side is a 
torturing rack t on the other a torturing contrivance 
known as the Spanish virgin.) 

Yes. {He covers his face and trembles with 
deadly agony.) Sylvia! 

Sylvia. (With trembling voice-) My dear friend 
Vesalius I 



Gr. Inquis. This, Vesalius, is another accuser and 
accomplice of yours. On the rack she has admitted 
that all is true that has been recorded in the archives 
of the Holy Inquisition as regards your misdeeds. 

Sylvia. I did not admit anything of the sort. 

Gr. Inquis. We are going to have this daughter 
of the Netherlands enjoy an embrace of what they 
call the Spanish Virgin! {He points towards the 
fearful instrument of torture.) And what such 
embrace means, Vesalius, you need not be told; no- 
body escapes alive from such embrace, because hun- 
dreds of daggers are set to work piercing the victim's 
cheBt. 

Well, Vesalius, I think you have changed your 
mind and are now ready to recant all your heretical 
teachings and burn all your manuscripts. 

Sylvia. Do not recant, my dear friend Vesalius. 
I am willing to suffer any amount of torture and 
meet death at any moment. 

Yes. ((Reaching out Ms arms toward Sylvia, 
and speaking under Ms breath.) The black hydra 
has won. I realize with what Sylvia is threatened if 
I do not recant. It is this torturing of my soul, de- 
signed by the most satanic cunning, that crushes me. 

Gr. Inquis. Take up your manuscripts and throw 
them into the fire ! 

Yes. Am I not allowed to keep one of them I It 
means the labor of a life-time, and it has been writ- 
ten with my life-blood. 

Gr. Inquis. The more it deserves to be inciner- 
ated, and to keep this one would-not-do-you-any- 
good. 

C Vesalius hesitatingly lakes up the manuscripts.) 



Gr. Inquis. Make haste! You have sacrificed 
Anselm, and his last greeting, "Moriturus te salut&t," 
still rings in your ears. If you hesitate, the next 
greeting will be "Moritura te salutat," for up till 
now no living being has been liberated alive from 
the "Spanish Virgin." 

Ves. You are the chief exponent of religious 
superstition and fanaticism, you are advocating and 
promoting the thraldom of the human mind. You 
are the excutioner of truth and justice, you are not 
only a tool of Satan but the embodiment of the anti- 
Christ! 

This is the age of the bondage of thought and of 
conscience. Future generations will be thankful for 
our martyrdom. The consequences of your devilish 
misdeeds will be an awful curse resting upon all 
those generations to come that are possessed of the 
same religious fanaticism. (He throws the manu- 
scripts into the fire.) 

(To himself .) Now Sylvia is saved! (The cur- 
lain is drawn to.) 

Gr. Inquis. Do you recant, Vesalius? 

Ves. I do. 

Gr. Inquis. I am sorry that you have only one 
life to spare to expiate one of the many capital sins 
you have committed. I herewith sentence you to 
capital punishment, to be cremated tomorrow at the 
stake. 

(pin outcry of agony is heard from behind the 
curtain.) Prepare yourself to face death. 

(Enter a messenger of the Kings placing a docu- 
ment with the seal of the King on the table in front 
of the Grand Inquisitor.) 



Messenger. I am here by the command of his 
most Gracious Majesty, the King of Spain, Philip II, 
in order to witness the publication of this letter of 
pardon in the presence of Andreas Vesalius, late 
body-physician of our most Gracious Majesty, Philip 
II, King of Spain. 

Gr. Inquis. {Breaking the seal and unfolding 
the document, reads.) 

I, Philip II, King of Spain, pardon Andre Vesalius 
of the capital punishment to which he has been sen- 
tenced, in order to give him time to repent his mis- 
deeds and in order to give him an opportunity to do 
penitence by a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. May 
God the Almighty show mercy and pity upon the 
perpetrator of so many misdeeds. 
Signed, 

Philip, II, King of Spain. 



SCENE VI. 



Vesalius ttmong Vie flips of Savoy, between Mount 
Blanc and the Great St Bernard: Vesalius in 
Pilgrim's (Dress and Supported by Ms Pil- 
grim's Staff, Taking a Best Up 
timong the Mountains. 

Ves. Once more I am at liberty to breathe free 
among the lofty mountains. Here, I, the defamed, 
am in the sanctuary of nature ; here heavenly 
quietude and holy stillness reigns, while within me 
roars a hell of anguish and despair. These sceneries 
overwhelm the soul with the irresistible power of 



their majestic grandeur ; these wonders of creation 
have evidently been shaped and built up by forces 
far-reaching and powerful beyond conception. The 
human mind tries in vain to conceive the unlimited 
and everlasting forces of nature that sway the uni- 
verse. And still the church pretends to have the 
only right conception of the great unknown, of the 
unknowable, of the unconceivable, and they call it 
God. Theology styles itself the science of God, pre- 
tending to know what we do not know, and what we 
can never know — God, the conceit of the unconceiv- 
able and unknowable. 

What Titanic forces must have come into play to 
pile up those gigantic pillars that pierce the clouds, 
and upon which the blue canopy of the heavens 
seems to have its bearings ! 

What a heavenly peace, what a blissful quietude 
rules this blessed spot ! Here every breath we draw 
is a prayer in the temple of nature! 

Oh, my dear friend Anselm, you are gone ! Your 
life has been sacrificed to the great cause of redeem- 
ing mankind from spiritual thraldom. Anselm ! 
Anselm ! Oh, if you could only be with me, up in 
this sanctuary of nature ! Here a white and im- 
maculate ermin of snow encases the heads and 
shoulders of those mighty towering giants, but be- 
neath this mantle of ice and snow is not death and 
decay, but slumbering life, with the unfailing hope 
of resurrection in spring, while down there, in cities 
as well as in villages, the black blood-stained pall of 
implicit and fanatical faith is spread over human 
minds to hold them in a stupor of dread and despair. 
Down there all intellectual life has been choked to 



death and there is faint hope left of a budding spring 
time of wholesome thought and hearty ideas. 

Here, surrounded by eternal snow and ice, I am 
left to myself; here, my tortured soul enjoys a 
transient rest it has craved for years ! 

You, my dear friend Anselm, have breathed your 
last by the virulent rancor of those who call them- 
selves ministers of the Lord. And such crimes are 
perpetrated in the name of an all-just and all-good 
God! 

Oh, my dear Anselm, if I could only embrace you 
once more! If I could only once more look into 
your eyes, lighted up with the fire of enthusiasm for 
the liberation of human minds from the dungeon in 
whioh they have been thrown by the all-mighty 
Church! 

Well, dear Anselm, you are now at rest ! 

Without a home I am forced to wander, expecting 
at any moment to be identified and abused in the 
most cruel manner. My steps are directed to the 
grave of the lowly Nazarene, the great instigator and 
heralder of truth, who suffered persecution and death 
for that unpardonable sin ! 

If it were not that another agonized soul, poor 
Sylvia, might find rest and comfort at my heart, I 
should not hesitate for one moment to seek and find 
rest, entombed by one of the avalanches thundering 
down from yonder snow-capped heights. 

Nothing but a grave, mountain deep, can emtomb 
my woe, and nothing but a tomb-hill, mountain- 
high, can bury my agony. Indeed, only in such a 
grave could my soul find what it is longing for, rest, 
eternal rest. 



A mind, rent with agony, and quivering from re- 
membrance of its suffering*, does not crave resurrec- 
tion. To my soul, everlasting sleep and oblivion is 
eternal bliss. 

All the most precious ideals I have nurtured in 
my heart have been shattered with devilish cruelty ; 
why not smash also the vessel, the contents of which 
have been destroyed 1 

But no ! one ideal, one friend, remains for me — my 
dearest Sylvia. If I can find no rest, she shall be 
comforted pressed to my heart. 

As soon as I return from Palestine, I shall meet 
her again. What a meeting it will be! On the isle 
of Zante she will be watching for the craft that is 
going to carry me back, and then we shall shake the 
dust of the old world from our feet and set sail for 
the New World, our refuge. 

And you, my dear friend, Servetus! You were 
ostracized, too, hunted like a wild beast. Starting 
from Spain and passing through the southern part of 
France I directed my steps to Vienne to see once 
more the place where you had been living, watched 
by the bloodhounds of the Holy Inquisition. When 
you realized that your life was endangered, you made 
up your mind to flee to Naples. Strange to say, you 
made way via Geneva and Zurich. Why, my dear 
friend, did you direct your steps to Geneva, knowing 
that Calvin, your deadliest enemy, lived there! 

(^ huzza is heard and Vesalius listens; the noise 
of falling ice and snow causes him to look upward, 
and there a mountaineer, donned in a dark blue, 
woolen garb, and using his Alpine slick, is climbing 
down a dizzy mountain path) 



Yes. I wonder ; there is another human being in 
this secluded wilderness! 

(Meanwhile the mountaineer reaches the spot 
where Vesalius is standing.) 

Mountaineer. Hello, stranger, what is your busi- 
ness here, high up among the Alps, and at this time 
of the year? 

Yes. I am on my way to the Hospice of the Great 
St. Bernard Pass, and thence to Italy. 

Mount. Stranger, surely you are mistaken. You 
are in a cul de sac ; you are in the neighborhood of 
Goliaz, and the vast snow-banks and glaciers there, 
yonder, are part of Mount Blanc. 

Yes. Would you mind showing me the way to the 
Hospice of St. Bernard? Take this for your trouble. 

Mount. Then you will have to retrace your steps 
for about five hours' walk ; taking the same path on 
which you came up. After having passed the Petit 
St. Bernard and Bourg Maurice, you ought to have 
turned to the right, into the Dora Baltea, which is 
the best way to Aosta in Italy. 

But, how in the world do you dare to cross the St. 
Bernard Pass at this time; are you compelled to 
beat your way under marching orders? The shortest 
and quickest way would be, as I say, through the 
Dora Baltea to Aosta, the Great St. Bernard Pass 
being out of your way. 

Yes. I must first call at the hospice, before 
descending into Italy. 

Mount. Oh, I understand, you are on a pilgrimage 
and somewhat under marching orders. Recently 
many pilgrims to the Holy Land have taken their 
way over the St, Bernard, but not at this time of the 



year. Father Pierre, our chaplain, told us that even 
the late body-physician of King Philip of Spain, of 
the name of Vesalius, is on a pilgrimage to the Holy 
Land. That fellow is a rank heretic and an arch- 
fiend of religion. He was threatened with the ban 
of the Holy Father at Rome, and by the Holy In- 
quisition sentenced to death because he had dissected 
the body of a lady at the court of King Philip, 
although her heart was still beating. 

I, myself, would never have pardoned such a scoun- 
drel ! Oh, I wish I would meet him ! I should take 
him over there on the top of Mount Dolent, up, and 
higher up, to a spot where chamois and steinbocks 
hardly venture. There stands a precipice about six 
thousand feet high, and from there I should push 
him into the yawning abyss! 

Would not such a deed please the Lord? 

A heretic who has occupied such a high position 
ought to be pushed down as deep as possible, down 
into the bottomless pit of hell ! 

Yes. Have you ever seen a heretic? 

Mount. Sure! I did not only see one, but {he 
shouts with glee) I assisted in cremating one at the 
stake ! Our chaplain says a heretic is a monster that 
ought to be cremated under all circumstances ; be- 
cause such a monster has the brain of a devil, the 
blood of a dragon, and the heart of a hyena, but has 
no faith. 

Well, stranger, I will do everything in my power 
to show you to the way to the hospice of St. Bernard. 
I will guide you over the Goliaz glacier, then you 
can not miss your way. Ten years ago at this very 
day I had the happiest day of my life, because I 



assisted in cremating a heretic and got indulgence 
for a hundred days. To celebrate the tenth anniver- 
sary I invite you to go with me and be my guest, but 
the valley I am living in ia rather narrow and the 
sun shines into it only in summer, and even then 
only for a few hours. 

The strangers that pass through our village do not 
like to sleep under roof, but prefer to put up tents, 
surrounded by guards. They say that if they sleep 
under our roofs, they are robbed of their valuables, 
and they call us a gang of robbers and our mountains 
"les montaignes maudites." 

Besides you can not use our Alpine stick as we do. 
With its aid we rush as fast as lightning over the 
sloping snowfields down into our valley. 

As soon as I have shown you the way over the 
glacier you had better be careful, for when you reach 
the bridle path you are close to a spot where they 
take all the bells from the sumpter mules and allow 
no one to speak. One loud word, one single huzza, 
might bring down an avalanche and kill you without 
giving you time enough to offer your last prayer ! 

Say, stranger, let me ask you a question in confi- 
dence; have you much money about you? If so, I 
would like to advise you to say so, for if you should 
meet with an accident and be caught and buried by 
an avalanche, then we Bhould know beforehand that 
it would pay to dig you out and provide a decent 
funeral for you. I assure you we should be pleased 
to dig up your worthy corpse, and if you can spare 
some money for a few bottleB of Coquempey wine to 
drink while we are digging up your honorable body, 
we will not mind throwing half a dozen pater-nosters 



into the bargain ! I promise you to find out tomor- 
row whether or not you have met with disaster. 

Ab soon as you reach the bridal path leading to 
the St. Bernard Hospice, and where you have to turn 
to the right, you are just in front of the morgue of 
the hospice. Pleas© walk in for a few minutes and 
say a prayer ; don't be scared, for this year there are 
laid out there about one hundred corpses, who look 
as if they were alive. The cold dry air protects them 
from decomposition and makes one realize that it is 
not altogether a bad place to become a corpse in this 
neighborhood. 

Yes. You arrived here with a huzza? Did you 
not fear the precipitation of an avalanche? 

Mount. No sir, because I had picked out this spot 
as comparatively safe for my hey-ho. It was hard on 
me to climb for twelve hours without a huzza, be- 
cause I was overjoyed, remembering the cremation of 
a heretic, and having got indulgence for a hundred 
days, and I made the sixteen hours from Geneva 
hither in twelve hours. I felt like a bird. 

Yes. What is the good deed that has yielded you 
such a bunch of indulgence? 

Mount. I did my share in cremating a heretic. 
Our chaplain had told us that in spite of the risk of 
breaking our necks we ought to go down to Geneva 
to witness the cremation of a heretic. Besides the 
pleasure, it would yield us indulgence for a hundred 
days, and the comfort of not being compelled in the 
hereafter to knock at the door of heaven, as it would 
be thrown open as if by magic and we would be 
entitled to walk in, head erect, and without being 
asked any questions. 



Ves. Do you know the name of the man who Buf- 
fered death at the stake? 

Mount. Sure! He was a physician from Vienne 
in France. His name was Servetus. 

Ves. (Willi deep emotion, to himself: find you, 
too, you dearest friend of mine, fall a victim!) 

Mount. It seems my tale interests you ! But the 
mere thought of a flaming stake makes one feel un- 
easy even here among the snow and the glaciers. 
That arch-heretic had sold himself to the devil, and 
according to his agreement with Satan had written a 
book with his own life-blood, the devil guiding his 
hand. Its title was "The Restoration of the Christian 
Faith, " which, of course, meant the restoration of 
the devil's kingdom. But the Lord did not suffer 
that fun should be made of him, and dropped a hint 
to the Holy Inquisition, and they found out that it 
was Servetus who had written that devilish book and 
secretly had it printed. 

Now the devil gave Servetus warning that his life 
was endangered, and he made up his mind to flee, 
but here, too, the hand of the Lord was manifest, for 
Servetus went to Geneva, although he knew that 
Calvin, another heretic, but his deadly enemy, was 
living there. By this time the devil thought his 
opportunity had come to swallow up the soul of 
Servetus and he induced him to go to a church and 
indulge in a sermon spiced with all sorts of heretical 
deviltry ; here he was identified and arrested. Thus 
the Lord managed that one heretic should betray an- 
other heretic and deposit his ashes at the stake. I 
hope to God that Calvin will be the next one to sit 
at the stake, and it falls to me to make it hot for him. 



Yes. (To himself.) What a world, and what a 
set of men, (fltoud.) Did Servetus suffer greatly? 

Mount I should say so? We took pretty good 
care to mete out a full measure of what he deserved. 
I tell you he not only wrote a book, but he wrote a 
big one, saturated with the rankest heresy. And he 
was not satisfied with shaking the foundations of 
the Church, but as a physician he indulged in 
necromancy, and asserted, as our chaplain says, that 
the blood in the human body is circulating. Well, 
is'nt that the rankest medical heresy? 

Yes. Did Servetus renounce? 

Mount. To be sure he did not. On the contrary, 
his last words were that the new faith for which he 
was suffering he would take with him into eternity ! 
In the middle of the month of August he was jailed, 
but not until this month did he get what he de- 
served. 

Yes. Deserved for what ; because he wrote a book? 

Mount. Yes, and a big one, too. But he was not 
cremated for what he did, but for what he did not 
do; he did not believe, as a good Christian ought to 
do. All the time he was in jail, they argued with 
him, and he could have saved his life if he had re- 
nounced his heresy, but the devil had such a grip on 
him that he could not be saved, as you will never 
succeed in talking the devil into the Christian faith. 
He is too smart for that. And this is the reason that 
they had to resort to force. You can neither by heat 
nor by flames exorcise the devil ; he is used to both 
from his abode in hell. 

But he can not stand any smoke or any prayers, 
and the best way of exorcising is either to smoke 



him out of the human body or to nauseate him out 
by prayers. 

For that purpose we piled up a stake of fagots of 
oak wood, with all the green foliage still on, in order 
to have no flaming fire. In the midst of that stake 
was a wooden block, low enough to have Servetus 
sitting on it, touching the ground with his feet. Be- 
hind that block a heavy wooden stake was put up, to 
which the body of Servetus was fastened by an iron 
ohain. Around his neck a heavy rope had been 
wound, not tight enough to prevent him from moving 
his head or from speaking. His head was adorned 
with a crown made of straw and sprinkled over with 
brimstone. 

Yes. And you say Servetus had to suffer a great 
deal? 

Mount. I should say so! As soon as the fire 
began to flame up, and the heat tortured him, he 
Bcreamed so fearfully that the whole crowd of spec- 
tators was shocked. Oh, I tell you life is worth 
living if one has an opportunity to attend such an 
affair ! 

Yes. I hope his agony did not last long. 

Mount. Thank the all-good Lord it did. He was 
in the greatest agony for at least half an hour. The 
wood being green and moist belched out such a lofcof 
hot vapor and smoke that the devil within Servetus 
could not stand it any longer, and, taking an iron 
grip on Servetus' poor soul, sold to him years ago, he 
twisted the neck of his victim, and with loud grunt- 
ing rushed out of his body down into hell ! 

Yes. Did you ever notice that any wild and blood- 
thirsty beasts ever tortured creatures of their kind? 



Mount. No sir, but beagts have no religion, and 
therefore have neither backsliders nor heretics. 

Yes. Then those beasts are well off! Say, I do 
not want to trouble you any longer. I think I can 
find my way alone. 

Mount. I think you, too, had better direct your 
steps towards Geneva. At the stake it is at all events 
warmer than when buried under an avalanche. 

Ves. I think for the present you ought to be 
satisfied with the first bunch of a hundred days' in- 
dulgence. And if I should find my grave under an 
avalanche, don't take the trouble to shovel me out, 
but let me rest in my snowy couch. 

(Exit Vesalius in the direction that had been 
pointed out to him.) 

Mount. {Looking in the same direction and hold- 
ing up his fist threateningly.) You are also a fine 
specimen of a Christian I Well, I shall soon see you 
again ; if not alive, then dead. Without a guide you 
won't be able to cross the Goliaz glacier ; you won't 
have to walk very far before the earth will open and 
swallow you up ! In one of the clefts of the Goliaz 
glacier your anatomy will surely rest. 

(^ voice and the interjection, ''Ouch" is heard. 
The mountaineer is startled; from behind a big 
bowlder a pilgrim, who is out of breath, appears; 
pausing for a moment he glances over the snowy 
ground before him. (Drawing back his cowl the 
features of the Dominican friar are visible. He 
mutters; "Huzza, I am still on the IrailP' dgain 
taking up the trail, he passes around the bowlder 
and gels sight of the mountaineer.) 
Friar. {To himself.) This is not the game I am after! 



Mount. Hello! there is another pilgrim who has 
missed his way ! 

Friar. Did you not meet a pilgrim, one taller 
than I ? 

Mount. He has just disappeared around the 
corner yonder ! 

Friar. It is big game ! Why do you not follow 
his track ! There is money in it ! He is the former 
body-physician of King Philip of Spain! He is an 
arch-heretic 1 

Mount. I thought so; he looked suspicious and 
talked the same way. I pointed out to him the way 
to the St. Bernard Hospice, and told him about the 
threatening avalanches, but ere he gets to the spot he 
has to pass the clefts of the G-oliaz glacier, and there 
is no need to push him into one of these clefts, be- 
cause he will surely tumble into one without my as- 
sistance. Those clefts, covered with fresh, innocent- 
looking snowdrifts, are reliable traps, from which no 
game whatever can escape. 

Friar. Well, thank God, at last he has been 
caught nicely ! 

"A heretic never slips our hooks ; 
We hound his heels, and in his wake 
We follow, from town to town, from land to land, 
On every hand our snares are spread" — 

{Turning to the mountaineer.) Here, take this 
purse, filled with gold, sufficient to buy Coquempey 
wine to last a life-time ; follow him, and at the right 
spot scream an avalanche down on his head. 

Mount. And on my head, too; at present I have 
no desire to die; no sir, that won't do for me! 



Friar. How would it be to awake the echo at a 
safe distance? Let us join and scream with the 
voice of a lion : "Death and eternal perdition to the 
heretics I " 

Mount. As regards avalanches, even the very spot 
where we are standing is not quite safe. 

Friar. You are a coward ! I will show you how 
to do it. (He shouts with all his might and at the 
top of his lungs.) "Death and eternal perdition to 
all heretics!" (& faint noise is heard from high 
up in the air.) 

Mount. (Raising his forefinger.) Look out, 
there is something going on now ! Oh, my Coquempey 
wine! (A fearful roar is heard, the air becomes 
dark, and with a tremendous peal an avalanche 
thunders down, burying both of them.) 



SCENE VII. 



Sylvia on a Cliff of the Seashore of the Isle of 
Zanle. 

Sylvia. {Shading her eyes with her hand and 
looking out to sea in a set direction.) No sail yet 
in sight ! Day by day, from early morn till night, I 
am sitting here with anxious yearning, looking out 
for the craft which is to bring back my dear Vesalius 
from his pilgrimage to the Holy Land. 

Lo, yonder, a sail emerges at last — at last, I say ! 
Everlastingly will I patiently wait if I am about to 
meet again my dearest Vesalius and embrace him I 

223 






Like the snow-white plumage of a swan the sail is 
set off against the sky. Yet close to it a dark cloud 
is hovering ; can the sky never be without thunder- 
clouds when I and Vesalius meet? 

There is lightning, and a faint rumbling of thun- 
der in the distance! Is that thunder begrudging the 
blissful happiness awaiting me? 

Are we to be constantly in agony? But, future 
generations will be thankful for what we have suf- 
fered in order to free minds of their bondage and 
gain freedom of conscience. 

The waters already are restless, and the white- 
capped waves and the storm birds seem to presage 
disaster. 

Now thunder and lightning are becoming more 
frequent ! Who speeds along those flashes of light- 
ning, who starts those thunders, who darkens the 
skies, who lashes the waters? 

It is the demons of hell ; it is the fate of Vesalius 
and me to be continually fought by those fatal 
demons. 

There the craft becomes visible ! How she struggles 
as if life were at stake ! What is that? There is the 
streamer, the signal agreed upon; it is my dear 
friend, Vesalius, who greets me ! Here is my greet- 
ing! {She waves a while veil.) Look there ! he has 
noticed my signal. 

Oh, what a blissful time is drawing near for him 
and for me! With all the boundless might of my 
infinite love I will press him to my heart and never 
again part with him! Our happiness will be un- 
limited. (Lighlning and thunder grow more in- 
tense.') What a fearful flash of lightning! What a 



deafening thunder! With what gigantic force the 
waters rise up, and the depths are yawning. Heavens! 
where is the craft? It has disappeared. Has a 
thunderbolt destroyed it; or the yawning depths 
swallowed up all that I cherish? My senses become 
confused! (She faints.) 

(Fishermen led by an old while-bearded man 
bring a stretcher covered with a gray mantle and 
place it down.) 

The Old Man. Here she is, the poor soul ; small 
wonder that she swooned! If she would but vanish 
forever I It is rather cruel to bring her to and make 
her realize her awful fate, for I know that the corpse 
that has been washed ashore is the body of Andreas 
Vesalius, whom I knew when he was the body- 
physician of the Emperor, Charles V, when I was 
working as a goldsmith at Brussels. He needs rest 
more than anybody else, and he shall have a tine 
resting place in the chapel of tho Holy Virgin Mary, 
with the inscription: 

Andreas Vesalius^ Bruiellensis. 

(Mi bends over Sylvia and administers some 
wine. She comes to.) 

Sylvia. Where is my Vesalius? I must see and 
embrace him. 

The Old Man. {Pointing out the stretcher.) 
There he is ! 

Sylvia. He is covered with his mantle; has he 
fainted, has he been hurt? 

The Old Man. He is unconscious forever. 

Sylvia. He is dead? My Vesalius dead? Oh, it 
cannot be! {She jumps to her feel and hurries to 
the stretcher and uncovers the body.) My dearest 



Vesalius, you are not dead! I am here! your friend 
Sylvia ! I Thou hast kissed me back unto life ; now 
my kisses shall awaken you. You are not dead! (She 
fervently kisses Vesalius.) No-response! He-is- 
dead! 

To experience such agony is thousandfold death ! 
( Turning lo bystanders.) My dear friends, provide 
a resting place for him, he Deeds everlasting peace, 
and I shall soon have it also. Vesalius, my dearest 
own, I do not forsake you ; true unto death, I follow 
you into death! 

{While the fishermen, led by the old man, lift the 
stretcher and depart, Sylvia in extreme agony covers 
her face with her liands.) 

Lightless is the world, my sun has set forever! 
Vesalius is gone, and with him all the blissfulness of 
my heart! How cold and lonesome is the world! 

What an awful fall from the lofty and eunDy 
heights of happiness down into the dark and un- 
fathomable abyss of utter despair! Hark, there is a 
voice that thrills my heart! It is thou, Vesalius, 
who calls me? Oh, my dearest friend, I am coming 
to be united with you everlastingly! We both need 
eternal peace and forgetful ness. 

What a delightful thought, to cast off the burden 
of a life that has become unbearable ! This, my life, 
was given to me without my consent, but I myself 
had to live it and bear it; it is my life, it is my suf- 
fering. No one has a right to bind me to a life of 
constant torture and utter despair. 

A life that has become unendurable we have a right 
to cast aside, and not, like a dumb animal, wait until 
we break down under a burden we cannot bear. 



There, yonder, in the western skies glows the 
heavenly orb about to set. As soon as that heavenly 
wonder sinks down into the ocean I shall also sink 
down into that vast realm of waters, down into its 
fathomless depths. 

Indeed, it needs an ocean to engulf and drown my 
boundless grief. The same element that has given 
eternal peace to you, my dearest friend Vesalius, 
shall also end my untold suffering! 

There, yonder, far distant in the western skies, lies 
the recently discovered New World! 

Oh, dear friend Anselm, you were right when you 
told us that nowhere but there would the master 
mind of Vesalius find an abode for rest. A new 
world! How the mere thought of it comforts the 
soul and exalts the mind; a new realm, where 
Vesalius' lofty mind could have soared eagle-like to 
the sunny spheres to breathe the ether of liberty. 

Now the sun is ready to settle into the vast realm 
of waters, and so am I ready to sink away into the 
bottomless depths of the sea! What a blissful 
thought, to sink down, deeper and deeper, until sweet 
oblivion of all the unspeakable woe we have suffered 
enshrouds our mind! 

What a delightful boon to my tortured mind to 
plunge into an ocean of sweet oblivion ! Indeed, an 
ocean of eternal oblivion is the greatest bliss I can 
conceive! I crave it! Let me embrace that sea of 
forgetfulness ! 

{The sun sets. Crying aloud, kt Vesalius, my 
dearest own, I am coming P she throws herself from 
the cliff.) 

THE END. 



m S fgng 



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